From the Ashes
by Marcus S. Lazarus
Summary: The discovery of the Alliance's latest experiments result in Serenity's crew joining forces with a living legend of the Unification War... and becoming embroiled in a tale of love and death five centuries old -Maliver & Paire-
1. Mourning

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: For those who want to know, this is a Firefly/Heroes crossover fic, set about a year after _Serenity _for the 'Firefly' cast; for the _Heroes _participants, this is set in the distant future, in an AU branching off from the currently-aired episodes of the series ("The Kindness of Strangers" onwards"). Elements from subsequent episodes may be mentioned as the story goes on, but otherwise only spoilers for the first season will _definitely _be put up here

AN 2: Just to establish in advance, this fic _will _have Mal/River and Peter/Claire pairings; if you don't like those pairings, don't feel that you have to read this story

From the Ashes

In a small transport ship, still a good few thousand miles away from the nearest inhabitable planet, its crew consisting solely of around six or seven people, its single passenger sat in her quarters, staring up at the ceiling as she reflected on what awaited her at the end of her journey.

It hadn't been an easy trip to make by any means- her traditional discomfort when forced to spend too much time among the company of a single group of people was a long-standing habit that it was hard to overcome-, but, in general, she liked to think that she'd managed to ignore her old fears fairly well and concentrate on the mission at hand.

She was fine on ships when she had something to keep herself occupied in either body or mind; it was only when she had _nothing _to do that she found herself reliving her memories of all those travels on the generational ships to come to this system from Earth all those years ago. Trying to remain an active role in the ship's life without actually making her… unique condition… obvious to everybody, unable to form any lasting friendships without running the risk of her secret being exposed, forced to move from section to section as best she could without making it obvious to everyone on board that she wasn't normal…

It hadn't been easy.

She liked to think she'd made a better life for herself since those days- setting up a decent enough life for herself on an Outer Rim world, eventually rising to the position of a commanding officer on the side of the Browncoats during the War for Independence. It hadn't been easy to win the respect of her troops given her apparent age, of course- she'd had to resort to disguises on more than a few occasions when speaking in public to ensure she'd at least _look _like she deserved their respect-, but overall she liked to think that she'd won a few decent victories in the War before things had all come crashing down with the Battle of Serenity Valley.

Even after all this time, that loss still felt like a physical wound to her. She hadn't been involved in planning the battle, of course, but she still felt as though she could have convinced her superiors to divert more troops to that battle before it had become a lost cause.

If nothing else had motivated her to go on this mission, it was the desire to meet the man who'd held the line in Serenity Valley as long as he could, even when it had seemed nearly hopeless; indeed, even when it _had _been hopeless. She wouldn't tell him who she was, of course- she doubted Captain Malcolm Reynolds would be interested in talking to one of the commanders who'd been involved in the decision to abandon the valley, even if she'd been against it from the beginning-, but that didn't change the fact that she was looking forward to seeing what he was like. From what reports she'd heard of him, she'd gathered that he was a man of contradictions, simultaneously acting like a callous criminal, but nevertheless willing to stand by his principles, refusing to take on jobs like slave-trading regardless of how much the clients were willing to pay him to do them, and standing up for those who needed it even if it meant he lost out on a job.

He wasn't a perfect hero, but then again, in her entire life, she'd only really known _one _man who came even close to being considered a _real _hero, and he'd…

_NO_! she sharply berated herself, trying to halt that traitorous train of thought before it could go any further, even as she knew it would automatically result in her mind going to places that she _really _wished it wouldn't go.

It had been over five hundred years since that terrible day had happened, and she still remembered it as clearly as if it had been yesterday.

The day that the first man she'd loved- in many ways the _only _man she'd ever loved- had died a horrible death, locked in mortal combat with his most powerful, most ruthless adversary.

She could never be certain why it was that he, of all the lovers- hell, of all the _husbands_- she'd had over the centuries, remained clear in her head regardless of how short a time he'd had in her life, to say nothing of the fact that their relationship had never been what she wished it could have been.

She knew all the reasons why it had been doomed from the very beginning, of course; he'd been older than her, he'd lived hundred of miles away from where she'd lived, they had drastically different lives, and, of course…

As her ship advanced onwards through space towards its next destination, she sighed in frustration as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a worn but still clear photograph, featuring the two of them standing side-by-side after his triumphant return to them following the first time she'd thought he was dead.

No matter how many times she looked at the picture, she continually failed to find something in their appearances that would remind her that what she'd felt for him had been totally sick; even after so many years, it was still hard to think of the last detail about their relationship without wanting to scream and/or hit something.

She'd been his niece.

He'd never known she'd even existed prior to their fateful first meeting, just as she'd had no idea who he really was, but there it was; his brother was her father, and they'd found out about it too late to do anything about their feelings.

Sometimes, she wondered if things would have turned out differently if she'd met him knowing who he was and what his relationship to her had been; would she have been so focused on the 'Uncle' aspect of him that she would never have registered him as a person, or would it not have made any difference in the end? Would she still have fallen for him with knowledge of what he was from the beginning?

In the end, though, she always came back to the same conclusion; she would have felt the same way about him regardless. There was nothing about his appearance to suggest 'Uncle' to her- it had been remarked more than once, back when they'd spent time together, that they didn't _look _like they were related-, so she wouldn't have had any kind of constant reminder that he was her father's brother, she had no memories of him being there for her growing up, he had no memories of her as a baby…

No matter how she looked at it, she couldn't come up with a single reason why, if she'd been introduced to him knowing who he was, she wouldn't have ended up feeling the same way about him as she did now. Even if he'd told her that he was her uncle as soon as he could- the whole thing with him trying to save her from Sylar didn't exactly provide either of them with a good opportunity to introduce themselves at the time-, the fact remained that he'd come all that way, with all available information suggesting that he was going to die, just because he'd been told that he had to 'Save the Cheerleader'.

How could she _not _have fallen in love with something who'd risk so much for someone he'd never met? If it hadn't been for the fact that they'd had her father just outside the door- coupled with the fact that he'd been in jail and looking remarkably poorly for someone with access to her power, of course-, she'd have kissed him as soon as she'd been left alone in a room with him.

Even after the truth had been revealed, and she'd been left feeling like she was totally sick for even continuing to _think _about him in that sense, she'd still wanted nothing more than to pin him to a bed and do… _things_… to him that she'd only ever read about. The six months during which she'd initially believed him dead had been some of the hardest she'd ever experienced, the pain of those memories only relieved by the knowledge that he'd come back in the end.

He'd taken a while to return to normal from the trauma of his last fight- his total lack of memory had been one of the main problems they'd needed to overcome, but it had been far from the only one-, but eventually he'd been the same as he'd been before.

After they'd found him in Ireland and his memory had started to come back following that terrible night in Kirby Plaza, the two of them had grown increasingly close, sharing with each other things that they'd never really had the courage or desire to share with anyone else before. He'd told her all about his ever-strained relationship with the rest of his family, his own fears about his powers, his time under Claude's tutelage; she'd told him all about the 'incident' with Brody Mitchum and the autopsy table, her 'suicide attempts' as she tested what she was capable of, her almost-romance with West…

Indeed, about the only thing they'd _never _talked about was the fact that they were related. It wasn't a case of 'If we don't talk about it, it isn't real'; they both _acknowledged _that the relationship was there…

They just didn't talk about it.

She'd shared everything else with him, but she just couldn't dare to talk about _that _with him, and he'd never brought it up himself. It had almost been an unspoken agreement with them; don't talk about what they _couldn't _have and why they couldn't do it, and focus on what they _did _have.

Then she'd lost him again, and this time, even after waiting for the rest of the natural lives of almost all their friends, he _still _hadn't come back.

Every last detail of that terrible day was forever etched in her mind, as well as all the events that had led up to it after their tearful reunion.

Then he'd… died (Or whatever had happened to him; even now she still wasn't very certain about what had happened back then)… in a desperate attempt to save her life, their old enemy coming back determined to claim the lives of the only people who'd ever effectively managed to stop him, and she'd lost even that little relationship with him in a single brilliant flash.

It had happened in moments, but even now, she could still see every last second of the day when any hopes and dreams she might have harboured about him had ended so abruptly, with his last heroic action in the defence of her and all their friends and colleagues.

From the moment he'd saved her life, all she'd ever wanted was to be with him, and even now, centuries later, she still treasured the brief time she'd had with him, even if it wasn't what she'd wanted.

"Colonel Parkman?" a voice said from outside her door. Glancing up, she saw the familiar form of the ship's captain, an ex-Browncoat who'd only introduced himself to her as 'Micah'- the name prompting a brief smile from her as she remembered the young boy who'd been more like a little brother to her than her biological _and _adopted brother back when she'd been young-, standing uncertainly at the door to her room.

"Yes?" she asked, putting the picture back into her coat pocket as she turned around, hoping that he wouldn't ask about it.

"We're coming up on Beaumont now; we'll be setting down in a few minutes," Micah replied, as he looked uncertainly at her. "You're sure you want to do this? I respect Captain Reynolds' reputation as much as any Independent, but the fact remains that he is… well…"

"A bit of a rogue element?" she smiled back at him, standing up and stretching slightly as she looked at the man before her. "Your concern's appreciated, Micah, but trust me; he's the man I want for this job. I don't want somebody who'll just do what I tell him because of my rep; I want somebody who'll let me come along, who'll voice his own opinions on what he thinks of my plan, and who's proven himself in a fight situation on more than one occasion where it really counted. If he's willing to help me out, I'll be waiting for him; if he can't…"

She shrugged. "Well, I'll cross that bridge when I come to it."

With that said, the seemingly young woman stood up, picked up her bag, and walked out of her cabin, heading for the main door that would soon open up to allow her to walk on to Beaumont once again.

If all went well, in a matter of days, she'd be on _Serenity_ and heading off on her next mission.

_Who knows_? she mused to herself as she walked, her small bag with her few long-term personal possessions carried at her side. _Maybe it'll give me something else to think about other than… than…_

She stopped herself right there; she was _not _going to finish that sentence.

If she finished it, she'd just end up naming him, she'd feel depressed all over again for a not-insignificant amount of time, and in the end nothing would have actually been gained from the whole experience…

But, even with all that in mind, she was still powerless to stop herself remembering the name of the young man who'd crossed an entire country- back when such a feat had been as far as you could go, rather than travelling from planet to planet like you were capable of these days- for no other reason than to save a girl he'd never even met, based on nothing more than a hunch, when all available information seemed to confirm that he was going to die as a result.

_Peter Petrelli_…

As she strode towards the cargo hold, the woman once known as Claire Bennet couldn't stop the tears trickling down her face.

He may have been her uncle, but for her, that was merely a biological joke played by a cruel twist of fate.

For her, Peter would always be the man she'd loved above all else, her hero second, and her uncle third.

That may not be right, but it was the way it was, and she couldn't change it any more than she could change the nature of her power.


	2. Contact

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: My skills with foreign languages are VERY limited so if somebody could give me a web site where I could find some Chinese terms to use later on in the story, it would be greatly appreciated, believe me

From the Ashes

As he sat down at the piloting station, the rest of the crew still resting in their cabins after the stresses of the last job- Jayne in particular still needed some time to heal after that stab wound he'd taken, to say nothing of the bullet to Zoe's shoulder, but Simon was confident they'd be fine in a few days- Mal allowed himself a few moments to just relax and plan their next destination after they'd dropped off their latest cargo. Assuming everything went well at the drop-off point- which he had no reason to assume it would; by the crew's standards this last job had gone fairly well-, they could probably afford to spend a few days planetside, maybe take in the sights, Simon and Kaylee could have some well-earned R&R, Inara could get some business of her own, and-

Mal cut that train of thought off before it could go anywhere else; he did _not _want his thoughts to start going places they shouldn't be.

The situation he was dealing with in that particular regard was awkward even _without _the fact that he was thinking about a girl- _woman_- who'd know when the thought crossed his mind almost before he'd finished it; he didn't want to go encouraging his mind. Putting aside Book's little sermon during the Saffron affair about the 'Special Hell', the whole thing would be a gorram nightmare for the crew if it ever got out that the captain was thinking about the pilot (But she was so much more than- _not _gonna go there!) in _that _kind of sense. Even without the fact that she'd only recently stopped being crazier than a box of frogs- and still had her occasional bad day, now that he thought about it- there was still the age gap between them to take into account. Hell, he was just a few years shy of being old enough to be her gorram _father_; he should be thinkin' of her as a _daughter_, not as someone he could… do _that _with!

_It's official; I am _definitely _goin' to the Special Hell at this rate_… Mal groaned inwardly, as he turned his attention back to the controls before him.

He wasn't sure if it would have been easier or harder if Inara had just stuck around permanently after the whole Miranda affair. She'd had a lot to deal with after what they'd discovered on Miranda, but, in the end, she'd decided that she'd prefer to continue working, even if her loyalties were no longer quite as… certain… as they had been before. She'd moved back to the training house where they'd picked her up for some time, but eventually returned to _Serenity _for business reasons, having found herself unable to fully live on an Alliance planet after all their discoveries. Her clients these days tended to number more among the pro-Independence sympathisers- or at least exclude the more blatantly pro-Alliance sympathisers- than they had in the past, but otherwise their arrangement was the same as what they'd agreed on in the beginning; they helped her get around, she gave them a bit of respectability, and that was that.

As for any kind of 'relationship' they might have had…

As far as Mal was concerned, that had all come to an end the second time she'd left the ship. They'd tried to make… something… work in the two weeks or so between their departure after the damage done to _Serenity_ while trying to send the Miranda Wave Broadcast and Inara's return to the house, but it just hadn't been able to happen; any real passion between the two of them had died long before that whole mess.

Hell, if Mal was honest with himself, he'd been partly inclining away from Inara and towards River ever since the whole thing with Rance Burgess and the whorehouse. Inara went and threw his feelings back in his face after that whole thing was over, just deciding to leave the ship rather than deal with what had… happened… between him and Nandi, but River…

When faced with the prospect of the crew being attacked and tortured by Jubal Early solely for harbouring her, even if she'd just been pretending to be possessing _Serenity_, her anger at Early for attacking the crew had reminded Mal so much of himself, in a way. Inara had never quite been able to get his dedication to the ship and the crew, but River?

Hell, she gorram _was _the ship for a few moments, even if she'd only been pretending; how could she _not _get it?

But the facts remained; he was old enough to be her father, she was only just at the age where she was legal in every sense of the word that mattered, she'd only recently stopped talking about how Book's Bible had been 'broken' or about how she could 'kill Jayne with her brain' at random moments, and she apparently had zero experience available to her in _that _sense of the term. He was a dirty old man with no right to think of her like that, and he should just stop it right there and then and get on with his life as it was, _without _her in it as anything more than one of his crew, albeit a very potentially _dangerous _member of his crew.

Just as he was trying to think of something else he could do while they were on-planet that _wouldn't _involve River- maybe he could try and wave Monty or somebody like that, see if they had any jobs coming up that they could use an extra ship for- he noticed a light blinking on the console, indicating an incoming long-range wave from an unspecified source. For a moment, Mal brightened somewhat- maybe he'd be getting his wish early for once and one of his contacts was trying to find him for the job- but then he activated the cortex screen and saw just _who _was on the other end of the link.

"Thought I told you I was like to kill you if'n I ever saw you again," he said grimly to the face on the screen before him.

"_And I acknowledge that fact, Captain_," the Operative replied, nodding in acknowledgement at his former adversary. "_However, I have recently come into information that I feel you should be aware of_."

"Can't think of a thing you'd say that I'd be interested in hearin'," Mal replied, half-reaching over to the buttons that would terminate the cortex link.

"_Come now, Captain_," the Operative replied, a slight smile crossing one corner of his mouth, "_you expect me to believe that you, the man who risked so much to help her, would neglect any information that would be interest to Miss Tam_?"

Mal couldn't quite hide his slight groan of frustration at that. He had to admit, the gorram sonofabitch had a point; he really _wasn't _able to neglect finding out anything about River. Even if he didn't have… how he felt… as a major factor, there was also the whole thing about her being on his crew, and, as he'd told Simon after they'd nearly ended up getting burned at the stake, he didn't abandon his crew.

"So," he said, turning back to grimly stare at the man before him, "care to clarify for me what you have to say? Understood you weren't exactly the most popular man with the Alliance after what you did for us."

"_And that remains the case, I assure you_," the Operative said, nodding briefly back at Mal. "_I am, as a matter of fact, no longer a member of the Alliance; although I retain some… contacts… among Parliament, I have also made contact with the underground group that aided Doctor Tam in acquiring the resources to break his sister out of the Academy_."

Mal raised an eyebrow.

"Really?" he said, looking at the Operative in a neutral manner. "And they've discovered something we should be aware of?"

"_Quite so_," the Operative nodded, his expression grimmer than usual as he looked at _Serenity_'s captain. "_According to my new contacts, the Academy program that Miss Tam was put through has been reactivated_."

Mal blinked in shock.

"Reactivated?" he said, staring sceptically at the screen. "They lost their gorram prize student and had their biggest secret broadcast all over the 'verse, and now they're starting that whole thing _again_?"

"_Had they chosen to implement the same procedure as last time, it would indeed have been a foolish attempt_," the Operative agreed, nodding in agreement. "_After the Miranda Wave, certain… information… became available regarding precisely how that information had become public, which included the truth about the Academy that Miss Tam was sent to. _

"Why'm I sensing a 'but' coming up?" Mal asked, his expression grim as he looked at the Operative.

"_Because you are not a foolish individual, Captain Reynolds_," the Operative replied simply. "_Although the original program has become impractical, the Alliance have changed their training methods and tactics significantly since then. Whereas before they had collected at least two dozen 'students', their current program consists of merely two subjects; Subject Alpha and Subject Omega_."

"Alpha an' Omega?" Mal repeated, still looking at the Operative as though he was trying work out what he wasn't being told right now. "They set up the program for _two _students? Seems a bit stupid; from what Simon told us about the hundan thing he dealt with last time, it cost a lot to get the kind of resources we'd be talking about here. Why the hell would they spend that much money for just two people; they may save money on equipment, but all the surgery an' that they must've needed to do to make River what she is now can't have been cheap…"

"_Were they simply recreating Miss Tam, it would indeed be impractical of them to devote the previous amount of money into the research_," the Operative confirmed. "_However, my contacts assure me that these two men are far more dangerous than Miss Tam could ever be; should the Alliance deploy them in a combat situation, they apparently possess the power to practically annihilate any forces sent against them, no matter the numbers or resources their foes could possess_."

Mal blinked in shock, but soon recovered his composure.

"You sure they weren't exaggerating?" he asked the man who'd one tried to kill him. "I mean, unless you can tell me any more about what these 'Subjects' might be capable of, it sounds more like Alliance propaganda rather than an actual threat-"

"_Captain_," the Operative said coldly, the look on his face momentarily reminding Mal of his expression when he'd confronted Mal in Mr Universe's compound after Mal had triggered the Alliance/Reaver showdown above the planet. "_My contact told me that much shortly before he was killed by an Alliance soldier who had discovered his treachery; I was barely able to terminate the connection before his killer managed to trace my location. He _died _to provide me with what information he could, Captain; it is authentic, I assure you_."

"Uh… right," Mal said, biting back his immediate retort that the Operative was hardly one to be talking about stuff like that given his past history; if the Academy _was _starting up again, he definitely wanted to know everything he could before he started telling the crew about it.

"So," he said, looking back at the man on the screen before him, "care to clarify why you're tellin' me about all this? I mean, it's fascinatin' an' all, but I'm not entirely clear on why me an' mine should get involved…"

"_On the contrary, Captain; you see _precisely _why you should get involved_," the Operative said, with that slight little smile on his face that had always gotten on Mal's nerves during his initial confrontation with the bastard. "_If the Academy program restarts, it is only a matter of time before Subjects Alpha and Omega are dispatched to eliminate the remainders of the previous program. If the Academy is still in the early stages, as my contact suggested, it may be possible to liberate or eliminate- whichever the situation demands- Subjects Alpha and Omega before they are ready for combat, and Miss Tam is one of the few people who may have any chance against them in a fight_."

"Pittin' the old prodigy against the newer models?" Mal said, staring sceptically at the Operative. "You'll forgive me if'n I'm a bit doubtful at our li'l albatross's chances against those kind of odds. No matter how good she is, I don't fancy our chances against two people who sound like they're meant to be even _better _than her, particularly when we got no clue what we might be up against-"

"_Which is why you'll be making contact with a member of the organisation that enabled Doctor Tam to free his sister from the Academy in the first place_," the Operative stated. "_She apparently possesses a great deal of talent in overcoming long odds, my other contacts assure me that she is exceptionally difficult to defeat in combat, and_…"

After a momentary pause, the Operative continued. "_She even says that she may be able to help Miss Tam get a better degree of control over her powers_."

Mal blinked in surprise.

River with more control? He wasn't denying that she'd made progress- there were times when she genuinely seemed to not know what somebody was thinking, rather than just pretending not to know to avoid making them uncomfortable- but if this woman knew _anything _that might help River make progress…

Hell, he practically had an _obligation_ to make sure she and River met if that was the case.

"Where do I find her?" he asked, turning his attention back to the Operative.

"_She's waiting for you on Beaumont; I hope that isn't too out of your way_," the Operative responded, looking inquiringly at Mal.

Glancing briefly at the solar system map on the computer, Mal shook his head.

"Shouldn't be too tricky; just give us a few days to drop off our current load and we'll be there soon enough," he said, glancing back at the Operative. "That OK?"

"_That should be fine_," the Operative responded, nodding in confirmation. "_She will be waiting for you and Miss Tam in the Maidenhead- she has made it clear that she will meet with no other- and will identify herself as Claire Bennet_."

"Alias?" Mal asked, looking inquiringly at the screen.

"_On the contrary, Captain_," the Operative replied, a slight, enigmatic smile on his face, "_from what I saw of her, I believe it may be the first time for a while she has told anyone her _real_ name_."

Before Mal could ask the Operative what he meant by that, the former Alliance assassin terminated the call, leaving Mal staring at a blank screen. After a moment's silence, he sighed and stood up, turning around to walk back towards the main area of the ship.

The sooner the crew had confirmed whether or not they'd be willing to get involved into this situation, the better, as far as he was concerned.

Besides, if there was any kind of chance that they could get away from this with further information that might help River get better control of his powers, he'd probably drop in on Miss Bennet just to see what she had to tell him about that.


	3. Back to the Maidenhead

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

The next morning, after the crew had finished their breakfast and departed to their respective work locations for the beginning of the day, Mal found himself sitting in _Serenity_'s cockpit with River, looking inquiringly at the young reader after telling her about the Operative's message. As much as he knew this was a crew decision more than anything else, the fact remained that it was predominately River who would be most affected if they took the job, and she thus had the right to hear about it before he told the rest of the crew anything.

"So, what d'ya think, li'l albatross?" Mal asked, reflecting to himself that he really needed to find a better way to remind himself of her age by referring to her as that; he was never entirely sure if she liked the name or not. "Want to check it out? Understand if you'd prefer to stay out of there, o' course, but-"

"They stole the saviour," River stated, staring ahead of herself with the same partly blank stare that she always had when she was having one of her 'reader moments' as Mal thought of them; she never really made much sense at these points, but she made more sense than she did sometimes. "Took him from the cheerleader and the heroes; took him from everything he knew, except the other."

"The other?" Mal asked, looking inquiringly at the young woman (And _da-shiong bao-jah-shr duh la doo-tze_, he wished he _didn't _think of her as a woman nowadays) before him. "What other?"

"The other with him," River said, as she glanced back at Mal, suddenly looking like she was fighting not to cry. "Brothers in skill but not in method; he never touched them but there's blood on his hands… so much blood… so much rage at the world for what he thinks it took… he hates the savior for being everything he has to work to be… patchwork in the brain…"

"Hey, easy, easy, li'l albatross…" Mal said, walking over to take her in his arms- once again cursing himself as he took a brief smell of the scent of her hair; how was it she could be more enticing to him without even trying than Inara had been throughout all her time on the ship even _with _her training?-, holding her against him as she sobbed for a few moments before she stilled against him.

After a moment's silence, Mal finally spoke, unwilling to remain in this position for too long in case the doctor came in and chose to ask some rather… potentially awkward… questions about why his captain and his sister were in this particular position.

"So," he said, pulling back from the young reader, trying not to reveal just how much that particular hug had actually affected him, "care to… uh… clarify for the rest of us how that affects your decision to take this job up?"

Staring him directly in the eyes, her face now holding a serious look that he hadn't seen since he'd found her entering the data on Miranda into the computer, River looked up at Mal with a fierce earnestness.

"She needs us," she said simply as she looked at the captain. "We have to help her."

"Bennet?" Mal inquired, tilting his head slightly to one side as he looked at River.

"She's come so far," River replied, as she solemnly looked back at him. "She needs this; we have to help her."

Looking back at the woman he loved (_THOUGHT OF AS A CREW MEMBER AND NOTHING MORE_; Mal just hoped she'd picked up that second, far 'clearer' thought rather than its predecessor), Mal sighed slightly in resignation.

If River said that Claire Bennet would need them, Claire Bennet was going to gorram get them; the reader's visions may not be easy to get at times, but they were _never _wrong.

"All right," he said, standing up as River did the same, "let's go and get this thing said."

* * *

A few minutes later, the now-seven-man crew of _Serenity_- there were definitely times when Mal wondered if he shouldn't see about hiring somebody new, if only to try and make the void left by Wash and Book's deaths seem a bit less big- stood in the cargo hold, Mal looking around at them after filling them in on the Operative's message. 

After a moment's pause as everyone took in what they'd learned, Jayne broke the silence.

"How the gorram hell can these suckers be _worse _than moonbrain?" he asked, indicating River with a jerk of his thumb. "I mean, she stood up against a whole roomful of Reavers and walked away; what could these suckers have that makes them _more _lethal?"

"Don't know, couldn't gather, and don't rightly think it matters," Mal said, as he looked back at the merc. "Way I see it, we get in there early enough, we can take them down before they have the chance to become much more of a problem than they might be at the moment; maybe we can even get them away before they begin to screw too much with their minds."

"Look, even if he's not lyin' about how dangerous they are, what makes you think you can trust the _liou coe shway duh biao-tze huh hoe-tze duh urtze_?" Jayne pointed out grimly.

"As surprised as I am to be saying this, I… agree with Jayne," Simon said, looking over at Mal, trying not to pay too much attention to the teasingly shocked expressions on Kaylee, Zoe, and Inara's faces; River was just sitting at one end of the table listening to the exchange and didn't seem to feel like making a contribution. "As I recall, you said you'd kill him if you met him again?"

"True," Mal replied, nodding slightly in acknowledgement of the former doctor's point. "But in this case I won't have the opportunity to see him again; he's arranged for River an' me to make contact with a 'Claire Bennet' on Beaumont once we've dropped our cargo off. Won't ever have to see the piece of _go su_ throughout the whole operation; he's just put us in touch with the person who'll help us deal with the situation we've got to deal with right now."

"Wait a minute; you and _River_?" Simon said, looking critically at the captain. "I'm not denying she's better than she was, but I really don't think you should be bringing her into something like this; she's still-"

"Not toothless anymore," River stated solemnly, glaring over at Simon as she spoke. "The cub became a lion and she's ready to attack; doesn't need protecting any more."

"Uh… what she said," Mal said, nodding slightly in River's direction as he looked at Simon. "Anyway, it kinda _has_ to be us two; Operative made it clear that Miss Bennet'll only talk to us an' nobody else, and we need her help if we're going to get any more information on this thing."

After a moment's silence as the crew took in what Mal had just said, Zoe finally voiced her thoughts on the matter.

"Seems reasonable enough to me to say we can trust this whole thing," she said, nodding in agreement at the captain. "We don't have to meet that piece of _go se_ to tackle the problem, and he gets to stop a program designed to create livin' weapons that make him look like a bow and arrow next to a Lassiter."

"Pretty much," Mal said, nodding in agreement at his oldest friend. "Even if he ain't bein' totally honest with us about his change o' heart- and I got no reason to think that's the case-, doubt he'd want to be replaced like that."

"We have to be the ones he needs," River spoke up, looking resolutely around at the others. "He saved us; we need to save him."

After a moment where the crew looked at each other uncertainly, Zoe shrugged.

"Don't quite agree with the fine details of that statement, but the essential gist of it certainly fits," she said as she looked at Mal. "Man may not quite have _saved _us, but he helped us; be kind of unreasonable not to help him back, particularly since it'd involve us doing something we'd probably get involved with anyway."

Mal nodded; as always, Zoe had hit the nail on the head regarding exactly _why _they were doing this.

He didn't care about paying back the Operative for the help he'd given them in patching up _Serenity_- when he'd been part of the reason it had ended up damaged in the first place, it limited the amount of sympathy Mal was prepared to give him-, but he _did _care about helping River.

If she said they had to do it… well, even when she'd been harder to understand, she hadn't said a single wrong thing.

Embarrassing for some people, yes; wrong, not really.

"Right then," he said, standing up and looking over at River. "Let's be plottin' the course; we're about a day away from our next port of call, and from there we just get to Beaumont as fast as possible and take it from there after picking up our passenger. Dong ma?"

"Dang ran," Zoe said, nodding in agreement along with the rest of the crew.

* * *

A few days later, their latest cargo- a shipment of protein bars from a derelict, these ones acquired far more easily than the load they'd picked up shortly before meeting Simon, Book and River for the first time- having been dropped off with Badger and the course set to their next destination, _Serenity _was once again docking at Beaumont, Mal and River waiting at the main door. In contrast to the simple dresses she'd commonly worn during her 'moonbrain period'- as Jayne referred to her pre-Miranda status-, River was now wearing a pair of dark trousers and a simple dark green top, while Mal was dressed in his usual clothing. He wasn't sure if Claire Bennet had been provided with a description of himself and River, but if she hadn't, he wanted to make sure he was wearing a distinguishing mark of some kind, and his coat was the most likely thing he could think of to draw attention to himself. 

"Right then," he said, turning to look over at Zoe, "keep an eye on the Cortex; anything goes wrong, or if you don't hear from me an' River in an hour, take off an' get out of here as fast as possible."

"Sir-" Zoe began.

"_Don't_," Mal said, shaking his head as he looked at her. "We're thinkin' about messin' with an Alliance-funded project here; chances are something we can't afford to take."

For a moment, Mal thought that Zoe was going to say something else, but, in the end, she nodded in acceptance.

"See you when you get back," she said, nodding briefly at the two of them.

"The cheerleader will be with us," River said casually as the doors before them opened. "We'll be fine."

As the two of them walked out of the ship, Mal tried not to think too much about how utterly bizarre that last statement had been. He had some vague memory of cheerleaders from an old history book he'd read once- something about girls in short skirts cheering sports teams back on Earth-That-Was, he vaguely remembered- but he doubted that there were any of those still around, and he couldn't understand what they could have to do with this situation anyway. As appealing as it might be to see River in one of the outfits he recalled from the book (_HE HOPED THIS MEETING WENT OFF A BIT SMOOTHER THAN THE LAST ONE HE'D HAD IN THIS BAR_), he supposed that all he could do was wait and see how things turned out.

After the two of them had walked a short distance from the ship, they were once again standing outside the Maidenhead bar, Mal smiling slightly over at River as they paused at the entrance.

"Now, remember; don't go lookin' at the Cortex screens an' going all Reaver-killin' psycho on me," he said, a slight smile on his face as he looked at River. "We've got enough of a situation waitin' for us as it is without that on top of everythin' else."

"Naturally," River smiled back at Mal. "I'll stay controlled, I promise."

Nodding gratefully at her, Mal walked into the bar, placing his gun in the security station at the top of the stairs before he descended down to the main bar, River close behind him. As they stood at the bottom of the stairs, Mal glanced around himself, looking for anyone who might be their current contact, only for River to suddenly point towards a table in the corner.

"There," she said, looking back at Mal. "That's her."

Looking in the direction of River's finger, Mal had to wonder if this was going to be the first occasion that River had steered him wrong. It wasn't that he doubted that women could be as capable as men in a fight situation- having fought alongside Zoe for most of the war, to say nothing of what he'd seen River do, he'd have been stupid to think something like _that_- but the woman sitting at the table didn't look like she was capable of what the Operative had said she was. She appeared to be in her mid-twenties, with shoulder-length blond hair and brilliant green eyes, and a body that had clearly been honed to its physical peak without making it obvious. She was dressed in a long black coat and dark trousers, with an empty gun holster under the colt the only obvious indication of her use of a weapon, although Mal thought he saw some hint of a sword's scabbard sticking out of her back as he looked at her.

"Miss Bennet?" he asked, looking inquiringly at the woman, deciding to leave any swords that may or may not be there until later.

"That's correct," Miss Bennet said, standing up to shake his hand. "Good to meet you at last, Captain Reynolds."


	4. First Impressions

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it 

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: OK, for those of you who read the last chapter and didn't understand some of River's ramblings, no worries; future chapters will feature Claire explaining in more detail about her past and what River meant by all that talk about the 'cheerleader', the 'saviour', and the 'other'

From the Ashes

As the two people sat down in front of her, Claire Bennet quickly made her first personal assessment of Malcolm Reynolds and River Tam. Captain Reynolds, she was pleased to note, matched everything she'd gathered about him from his files; strong-willed, resolute in his goals, a clearly capable fighter, and undeniably equally efficient at planning a response to a situation. Even know, when meeting with a contact whose identity had been vouched for, he was still scanning his surroundings for any sign of a potential trap or an accomplice who might be out to kill or capture him and River.

Plus, of course, there was the oh-so-minor fact that he was giving off an almost ridiculous amount of pheromones in the presence of River; there was _definitely _something going on there, even if he didn't want to admit it. The extra abilities Claire had developed over the years as her healing ability rebuilt her body better than it had been to start with may have been a pain to learn how to use, but they could come in handy sometimes; her senses functioned with a range that would have prompted Hiro to make a Daredevil comparison if he'd known about them, and she operated above the peak of physical perfection even without all the work-out sessions she did on a regular basis.

And speaking of her enhanced senses…

It only took looking in River's direction- and taking a brief sniff, of course; Mohinder's later studies had revealed that certain elements of a 'special's' DNA caused subtle differences in their body chemistry, hence altering their scent according to the power they possessed- to confirm what she'd suspected from the beginning; this girl had some _very _interesting powers. Based on what she'd seen in the files on Miss Tam that had been acquired from the Academy's files, as well as what she'd managed to determine right now thanks to her heightened sense of smell, River's powers seemed to consist of a combination of Matt Parkman's and Monica Dawson's, with possibly something of Charlie Andrews included in there; low-level telepathy, photographic reflexes, a near-perfect memory, and- based on what she'd read in the files- some slight ability to see the future.

She wasn't the most powerful 'Special' Claire had ever met, but she was definitely not somebody to be underestimated in a fight. With her photographic memory combined with the reflexes, she'd be capable of rapidly processing any fighting technique she was shown whether as a physical demonstration or as something she'd read in book. Plus, thanks to her perfect memory, she would not only be able to remember general facts about life as a whole, but also, when she was in a fight, her memory would practically ensure that she'd always know what weapon to use on what body-part to cause the maximum amount of damage with the minimum amount of effort.

Of course, the telepathy and the ability to see the future would also add to her effectiveness in a combat situation, but based on the files, Claire doubted River had total control of those particular aspects of her powers. Stripping her amygdala may have rendered River capable of picking up far more information than even Matt had been able to read at his best, but it would have also rendered it incredibly difficult for the former dancer to pick out one specific thought amid all the other voices, to say nothing of making it difficult for River to turn the telepathy _off_…

"So," Captain Reynolds said, looking inquiringly at her and forcing her attention back to the matter at hand- she hadn't even realised she'd drifted off; she only hoped she hadn't missed anything-, "care to clarify for me why you want us to help you deal with the situation you've got goin' on here, Miss Bennet?"

"Pardon?" Claire asked, looking curiously at the Independent veteran. "Captain Reynolds, I'd assumed that you'd be willing to help me deal with _anything _involving Miss Tam-"

"Oh, I got nothing _against _helping you shut the Academy thing down; just wondering why you wanted _us _for it," Captain Reynolds clarified. "With all the resources you've probably got- if you're good enough to find out about the place, you've got to be good enough to get into it- would've thought you'd have a whole bunch of people available to help you get into the place."

"True," Claire admitted, nodding in confirmation at the man before her. "However, you and your crew have two things no other person I could contact would have; a personal investment in this whole affair, and experience in dealing with things that aren't exactly… normal people, shall we say?"

For a moment, Captain Reynolds simply sat in silence, looking at Claire as though he was trying to determine how he should respond, until he finally spoke once again.

"You referin' to these 'Subject Alpha' and 'Subject Omega' our… contact… told us about?" he asked, looking her up and down with an evaluating expression before he looked at her once again. "If we're talkin' about dealing with stuff that the average people don't normally tackle… no offence, but you don't quite look like you've dealt with that kinda thing yourself…"

"And Miss Tam does?" Claire pointed out, indicating River Tam as she sat at the side of the table, silently waiting for her moment to speak.

Glancing over at River Tam, Captain Reynolds smiled slightly- a smile that seemed familiar to Claire without her being able to specifically identify why it seemed so- before sharply turning back to look at her as though he'd only just realised what he was doing.

"Well… I know _why _she doesn't look like much; she had all kinds of strange stuff done to her at that 'Academy' place before I even met her," he said, trying to act as though his earlier gaze had never happened as he looked critically at Claire. "You, however, I know jack about… less'n you care to clarify for me how you picked up the… skills… that you'd need to get that kind of experience at your age?"

Despite his tone, Claire had to admire Captain Reynolds' spirit; his words may be hostile to her, but underneath them was a definite edge, making it clear to her that he wasn't going to let her anywhere _near _the people he cared about until he was certain they wouldn't get hurt.

Admittedly, Claire wasn't _quite _ready yet to tell him everything about her- she'd prefer to get to know him better and thus determine how he'd react to the news that she was nigh-on unkillable-, but she might as well tell him what she could right now and hope that her guess about River's control was accurate.

"Let's just say that I have some… extra talents," she said, looking over at River as she spoke, hoping that she'd understood the full scale of River's talents; if the psychic wasn't able to vouch for her, she was in trouble. She had to lower her mental 'shields', of course- over time Matt had managed to perfect his telepathy to the point where he could teach others how to block it, thanks to a simple technique combining meditation with a matter of willpower and a mental 'suggestion' planted by Matt's powers-, but she considered it worth the effort it would take to get them back up if it gave River Tam a better chance to confirm her story.

She needn't have worried, though; River had only looked her in the eyes for a moment before she smiled and turned back to look at Captain Reynolds.

"She's a hero," the young woman said simply. "She can walk through the worst of danger and survive, she won't tell on us, and she won't back down from the other."

For a moment, Claire thought that Captain Reynolds was going to ask for further clarification about what his young pilot- she was fairly sure that was River's role on _Serenity _in the aftermath of the Miranda crisis- actually meant by all that (Truthfully she wouldn't have minded some clarification about some of the things River had said herself), but, after a moment's reflection, the Captain simply nodded and turned back to look at Claire.

"Learned a long time ago that thinking that Miss Tam's wrong's a stupid thing to do, even if she's hard to follow at times," he said, as he looked her directly in the eyes. "Just know one thing; if you _do _turn out to be the exception that proves the rule, and if you do anything- _anything_- to endanger my crew, you'll be stuffed in that airlock and thrown out of there faster than you can blink."

"Check," Claire replied, nodding in understanding at the man opposite her. Truthfully, she wasn't sure if even _that _could kill her for good- maybe it would be like when she got something lodged in her head and only healed when it was removed-, but given how unlikely it would be for someone to actually pick up her body if it was dumped in deep space, she'd rather _not _have to find out the hard way.

"Good," Captain Reynolds said, as he stood up and indicated the stairs. "Let's go."

With that, Claire and River both stood up, the three of them walking out of the bar, only pausing briefly to allow Claire and Captain Reynolds collect their weapons from the security station where they'd left them upon entering before leaving the bar and heading for the ship port. Admittedly, Claire depended on her sword more than her gun in a fight- one of the side-effects of having spent so much time with it, she supposed-, but she still liked to have the option of going long-range in a fight if she needed to.

Even after all this time, she wasn't sure if she used the sword because she was just comfortable with it or because it was one of the few things she had left to remember her old friends from back when her powers had first manifested and they'd formed their little 'team'. Peter had been the first to go, of course- D.L. and Isaac may have been regarded as posthumous members of the team, but they still hadn't died while _part _of the group-, but after that the deaths had all been different.

Even after five hundred years, Claire could still remember the fates of her first 'team'- they'd been unofficial, but they'd still been a team- like it had only happened last week.

Not all of the losses had been violent, but those that had been had certainly been dramatic. Nathan had sacrificed himself to fly a nuclear bomb out of harm's way- he'd taken it into the upper reaches of the _atmosphere_ before it had exploded-, Niki had been killed in a fight with a 'Special' who could turn her body into a liquid metal- Hiro had often compared that one to the T-1000 from the second _Terminator _movie-, Mohinder had been killed by a modified version of the Shanti Virus that had killed his sister- the cure he'd found after studying his corrupted DNA had saved others, but his own condition had been too advanced by then-, and Matt had suffered serious brain damage when he shielded them from a 'Special' who could generate a brain-scrambling psychic 'scream'- like the Sirens of myth, her screams had been driving those who heard her nearly insane, and it was only through Matt's sacrifice that the team had managed to stop her-…

Even after so many centuries, Claire still hated the fact that so few of her friends- the first people who ever truly understood and accepted her for being who she was, rather than what she pretended to be- had managed to live the long, healthy, happy lives that they should have earned for their sacrifices and the risks they'd taken to protect innocent people from a world that was evolving and changing faster than conventional science could cope with.

They'd been heroes, but in the end, they'd been unable to save themselves to live the lives that they'd earned hundreds of times over.

Only Hiro and Micah had made it to a point where they'd died of natural causes, although all of the team had left behind their own families and significant legacies in their own right. None of their children had precisely inherited their parents' powers, of course- Micah's power bore no resemblance to Niki and D.L.'s; why should other children copy their parents' 'talents' exactly?-, but they had all manifested in their own way at varying times in their lives. As the only member of the original generation left, Claire had taken it upon herself to keep an eye on them as well as she could, and had become an unofficial teacher for the next generation of 'Specials', keeping up that role until the exodus to other solar systems had necessitated them splitting up and making their own ways to humanity's new home. Claire had tried to find their descendents after the ships had reached their destinations, but her successes had been limited; she'd found some of them, but so many had eluded her, and the sheer scale of possible locations for Specials to be these days meant that it would take her ages to find them.

Unfortunately for them all, in Claire's opinion, the Company that had been founded by her grandparents and employed her adopted father- the company created for the primary purpose of monitoring and controlling Specials- had also survived to the present, in the form of that 'Blue Sun Corporation'. Their successes had been limited, of course- not even the largest company could effectively keep track of people whose ancestors had needed to spend almost a hundred years- but they'd still managed to find some prominent Specials thanks to their efforts. River was the most powerful Special that Blue Sun had discovered so far based on what Claire's contacts had gathered- their other contacts only had relatively simple talents, such as slightly enhanced strength and speed or low-level telepathic abilities; nothing as significant as River's powers-, but if what Claire had heard about these 'Subjects Alpha and Omega' was accurate, it sounded likely that Blue Sun had discovered what Hiro had liked to call 'Class Five Specials' (He claimed to have come up with the term after watching _X-Men: The Last Stand_, and used it to describe himself, Peter and Sylar due to the sheer variety of powers the latter two possessed and the near-limitless range of possibilities given to him by his own powers).

She wasn't entirely certain if even she, River, and the rest of _Serenity_'s crew could stand against _two _Class Fives, but the way she saw it, this crew had gone up against a mass of Reavers and walked away; after that, it would hard to find something that they _couldn't _survive. No matter how powerful Subjects Alpha and Omega were, if this crew could handle a mass of cannibalistic superhuman monsters out for their blood despite being trapped in a confined space with limited resources, she was fairly confident that, with her and River on their side, this crew would pull through.

It wouldn't be a pretty fight, of course, but she was confident that they'd survive it nevertheless.

As the three of them finally reached _Serenity_- Claire had been so lost in thought she'd only partly registered that they were approaching the ship in question in the first place-, Claire could only hope that River's mental state wasn't quite good enough for the former Alliance protégé to pick up her panicked thoughts; the last thing she needed was for her secret to be given away by a psychic who had a few screws loose because some demented scientists had decided to try and expand her powers by hacking into her brain. Even Sylar's process for 'tampering' with powers- the closest analogy she could think of to refer to both situations, even if Sylar's objective had been to take the powers for himself while Blue Sun's goal had been to enhance existing ones- had only been successful thanks to his natural knack for knowing how stuff worked. As far as Claire was concerned, with amateurs screwing with her brain to that kind of extent, it was a miracle River was still able to _walk_, never mind make as much sense as she did these days.

As the ship's main entrance opened up before them, revealing a lowering ramp and two sealing doors that formed an airlock, Claire swallowed slightly as she stepped onto the ship.

_Here I go_, she thought to herself, clenching her fists slightly as she walked up the ramp. _Off to fight the Company again_…

Despite the seriousness of that last thought, she smiled slightly at the next one that crossed her mind.

Just like old times, really.


	5. Bonding with the Crew

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As Mal and River finally became visible amid the crowds that filled the docks around the ship, Zoe- currently standing at the front of the cockpit to keep an eye out for any new arrivals- smiled slightly as she saw the blonde woman walking alongside them; at least it looked like the Operative's intel had been accurate.

The woman they'd met didn't look like much, true, but judging by River's relaxed attitude towards her presence, coupled with the way she held herself, Zoe was prepared to bet that she was a lot tougher than she looked at first glance; she'd had to develop a good knack for reading people's abilities in a fight during the war, and this girl looked like she had the potential to do some serious damage if she wanted to.

As she opened the ship's main door to admit the three new arrivals, Zoe turned over to another console and began to run through the pre-flight take-off procedures- she'd never be Wash, but she knew enough to do some of the more basic parts of the procedure by herself-, transmitting the last signal even as she closed the door.

"_Everyone_," Mal's voice said over the speaker system as the ship began to move once more, "_everyone get together in the dining area; we've got a new arrival, and I don't want to have to introduce her more than I have to_."

Smiling slightly as she turned the ship towards the sky and set the controls to autopilot, Zoe stood up and walked along the corridor from the control room to the main bay. As she walked down the stairs towards the main room, she smiled slightly as she saw the rest of the crew walked towards the main bay from the crew quarters; Inara looked as relaxed as ever, but Simon and Kaylee's slightly disordered clothes suggested that she'd contacted them in the middle of one of their… private moments, for lack of a better term. Jayne, she noted, was already in the main hanger; it looked to her as though he'd been working out with his weights when the call came and had decided not to bother changing for the new arrival.

Speaking of which…

Turning to look at the captain, River and their guest, Zoe was surprised to see a much younger woman standing there than she'd expected. Given how efficient the Operative had been at his 'old' job- she still was only partly convinced that he'd put all that behind him, even with River's words of reassurance-, she would have only expected someone to have earned the Operative's respect after several years of experience. The young blonde woman standing before her may look like she was in good shape, but at the same time she couldn't have been much more than a few years older than River; what the hell could someone like _her _have done to receive a 'recommendation' from the _Operative _of all people?

Then the young woman had turned to look in her direction, and Zoe instantly re-evaluated her opinion of the woman. Her body looked young, yes, but her eyes…

They told a totally different story.

They told the story of a woman who'd been on both the giving and receiving end of violence far more often than she would have liked, and who sometimes found it hard to even remember that there'd ever _been _another way than fighting.

Zoe knew that expression because, when she'd fought in the war, she'd reached a point where she saw those very eyes when she looked in the mirror. If it hadn't been for Wash showing up when she needed him…

Well, she wasn't sure what would have happened to her, but she doubted she'd have liked what she'd turned into.

"Everyone," Mal said, looking around as the last crew members walked into the main hanger, "this is Claire Bennet; we'll be workin' with her for this particular jaunt into the Alliance's new… academic enterprise, shall we say?"

"We're workin' with her?" Jayne said, looking appreciatively up and down Bennet's body as he walked slightly towards her, apparently not having registered what Mal had just said to them. "Gotta admit, for a gorram crazy lunatic, that Operative's knows some _very _interesting people -"

Before he could get much closer, Claire had reached a hand behind her back, drawn an extremely dangerous-looking sword, and had the blade held between Jayne's legs.

"If you try that again," she said casually, "I _will _remove certain important-but-unnoticeable body parts, and then I will remove your more noticeable limbs if you continue to prove incapable of getting the message. Understand?"

"Uh… check?" Jayne muttered, swallowing anxiously as he looked down at the blade.

"Good," Bennet said, drawing the sword back as she smiled friendly at Jayne. "Glad we're clear on that."

"Uh… excuse me?" Simon said, raising a hand as he looked curiously at Claire, indicating her sword with his other hand. "Pardon me for asking, but… can I take a look at that?"

Turning to look at the doctor, Bennet studied him for a moment, and then nodded and handed the blade to him.

"Just be careful with it," she told him simply. "It was from an old friend; I don't want it damaged."

"Thanks…" Simon said, taking the sword and holding up to the light. Looking at the blade, Zoe had to admit that it was a pretty nifty piece of work; the blade was in good condition, sharp and seemingly spotless, with a comfortable-looking black handle, and- now that she was looking- a black sheath slung over Bennet's shoulder. It was a simple-looking weapon, but it had a definite edge to it that Zoe couldn't help but admire.

Plus, of course, there was that strange-looking symbol inlayed in gold on the handle that Zoe made a mental note to ask Bennet about the first chance she got; it looked like a stretched S with a couple of lines drawn over it, kept carefully polished and shining despite the sword's evident age. She thought she'd seen something like it somewhere in her travels, but she couldn't be sure; she'd have to ask Bennet about it later if she got the chance.

* * *

"Interesting weapon," Simon said, passing the blade back to their new passenger with an appreciate nod. "Where did you get it?"

"An old friend gave it to me when he died," Bennet replied, as she took the sword and slid it back into the sheath on her back. "He used it to save those who couldn't save themselves; I keep it as a reminder of what he was capable of."

"Which was?" Inara asked, looking curiously at the seemingly younger woman.

"Being the second most selfless man I've ever met," Bennet replied simply, as she looked back at Inara. "You're Inara Serra, right?"

"Yes," Inara replied, looking inquiringly back at the young woman before her. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, just heard a lot about you on my rounds; been curious to meet you, that's all," Bennet said nonchalantly, before she turned back to look at Mal. "Captain Reynolds, if you don't mind I'd like to see my cabin."

"Uh… sure thing," Mal said, nodding slightly uncertainly back at her. He wasn't exactly used to new arrivals giving orders on his ship, but given that she was here to help them deal with a slightly larger-scale problem than what they were used to tackling he supposed he could make an exception in this case.

"oh… uh… chow'll be in 'bout an hour; that OK with you?" he asked, glancing inquiringly at Bennet as River headed towards the door leading to the passenger cabins, apparently having taken it upon herself to show Bennet to her room for this mission.

"That's fine, thanks," Bennet replied, as she stood up and headed for the door, River close behind her. "I'll see you then and fill you in on what I know."

With that, she and River had vanished into the bowels of the ship, leaving Mal to look inquiringly at his crew.

Finally, after a moment's contemplative silence, Simon spoke.

"Well," he said, clasping his hands together as he looked around at his friends with a slight smile, "she seemed nice enough."

"_Nice_?" Jayne repeated, looking at the doctor as if he'd grown another head. "She threatened to cut my gorram balls off!"

"Like I said; she seems nice enough," Simon repeated, a slight smile on his face as he looked at the mercenary.

"Definitely got some spunk, I'll give her that," Zoe said, nodding at the door that Bennet and River had just walked out of. "Wonder where she got the sword from; looked kinda old to me?"

"Thought that myself," Mal admitted, nodding in agreement at Zoe before he glanced over at Inara. "Recognise it?"

After a moment's hesitation, Inara nodded thoughtfully.

"Well, it _does _look like something I read about from Japanese culture back on Earth-That-Was," she said, as she looked back at Mal. "That type of sword was known as a katana; they were typically used by these warriors from Japanese culture known as the samurai, but became valuable examples of art after the samurai way of life became extinct."

"So, it's valuable, huh?" Jayne said, raising an eyebrow as he looked after Bennet, a different kind of appreciative gleam in his eyes.

"Are you forgetting that she just threatened to castrate you just for _hitting _on her?" Simon asked, shaking his head in frustration as he glanced back at Jayne with a slight smile on his face. "How's she going to feel about you stealing her weapon?"

"Oh… uh, right…" Jayne muttered, trailing off as he looked uncomfortably after Bennet and River before he looked anxiously back at the crew. "Can we just forget I ever said that?"

"Said what?" Mal asked politely, before he looked back at Inara. "Still, putting aside the general details, recognise anything more… personal about that sword? Where she might have got it, where it might have been before that, stuff like that?"

After a moment's thought, Inara shook her head.

"Sorry, I can't think of anything," she said apologetically, as she looked back at Mal. "I'll try and check out a few of my contacts; maybe they'll have heard something about it."

"Thanks," Mal said, nodding briefly back at her; if he knew some more background info about Bennet, he'd be more comfortable with relying on her in a combat situation.

"So, what now?" Zoe asked, raising an eyebrow at Mal.

Mal shrugged.

"Until Bennet's ready to talk to us, not much more we can do," he said dismissively. "You all just get together in the dining room in an hour. In the meantime, better make sure everything's set; if this thing's anything like as tricky as getting into the Osiris hospital was, I want to make sure everything's ready to go when we are."

* * *

As Claire laid her sword down in her cabin, she smiled slightly as she studied the surroundings that would be her home for the next few days. It was a bit sparse, of course, but over the years she'd learned to travel light; apart from the sword all she carried was a miniature datapad, designed by Micah Sanders near the end of his life as a memento to her of the rest of the group. Using the last of his powers before his death, Micah had managed to configure the datapad so that it would automatically keep itself in good condition no matter how long she possessed it, as well as being constantly compatible with any technologies she might encounter in her life. She generally just used it to store some electronic copies of some of her favourite books, TV shows and movies, along with some photographs she kept for sentimental reasons- the data storage capacity on this thing was _incredible_; she was still amazed at how much Micah's powers had evolved over the course of his life-, but that was still more than enough to keep her satisfied in terms of luggage for most of the time.

"You miss them."

Glancing back at the source of the voice, Claire smiled slightly as she saw River standing there; she'd forgotten that she hadn't managed to raise her mental shields back up yet, so River could still read her thoughts.

"Yeah…" she admitted, nodding slightly wistfully as she sat down on the bed and held the sword up before her, softly stroking the blade as she did so. "I mean, it may have been a long time ago, but they were still the first people I ever met who appreciated me for _everything _that I was. I mean, I had my adopted family and my school friends, of course, but the Bennets could never quite stop seeing me as their little girl, and Jackie and Zach kinda… well, Jackie preferred the part of me that wanted to be like her, and Zach liked the fact that I stuck out like a sore thumb in my own little way."

She shrugged slightly as she looked back at River. "But then, you'd know all about standing out, wouldn't you, Miss Tam?"

After a brief silence River nodded.

"Hard to remember how to be a girl since Miranda," she said, as she sat down beside Claire, her head bowed as she reflected back on her days at the Academy. "The Company wanted toy soldiers but broke the springs… too much at once… and they always look at me and see what I've become…"

"And that's a problem?" Claire asked, smiling a little as she leaned over to give the younger girl a one-armed hug. "As an old friend of mine told me once, I like who I am, and you need to learn to like who _you _are.

"Besides," she added, chuckling slightly as she looked at River, "if nothing else, I think it's safe to say that Captain Reynolds _likes _what you are just fine…"

Her voice trailed off as River's pale skin flushed slightly from embarrassment.

"Wrong thing to say, huh?" she said, unable to keep the sheepish tone out of her voice.

"He doesn't want me that way," River whispered as she bowed her head once again, her long hair concealing her face from view as she spoke. "Cares for me, but doesn't want to acknowledge it; he'd rather keep it locked away where nobody can see and it can't hurt anybody…"

"And you're prepared to _let _him do that?" Claire asked, looking inquiringly at River. "Look, if you feel the same way about him…"

"You and the saviour loved each other; doesn't mean it was going to work," River retorted, raising her eyes to look directly at Claire's. "Things aren't always simple; the Cheerleader learned that long ago."

Staring silently back at River for a moment, Claire finally sighed and nodded.

"Point," she said simply, before she placed another comforting hand on the psychic's shoulder. "Just… if you're going to use Peter and I as an example, remember one thing."

"What?" River asked.

"We could _never _have been together because of society's views on it; our family was only one of a few factors that stopped anything from developing between us," Claire replied, looking pointedly at her as she spoke. "You and Mal, on the other hand… well, the only real problem is your age and what Simon would think of it; take that out of the equation, and you've got nothing to worry about."

After a moment's thoughtful silence, River spoke again.

"Still don't know how to belong," she said simply.

Claire shrugged.

"Does _Mal _know how to really operate in some of the situations you guys deal with these days?" she said, smiling at the young reader. "Just… think about it, OK? Sometimes, even the most normal of people kind of like spending time with the freaks."

"Like Ando, Mohinder and Audrey?" River asked, raising an inquiring eyebrow as she stood up and walked towards the door, pausing only to glance briefly back at Claire.

Claire smiled.

"Pretty much, yeah," she said; she'd almost forgotten about the group's unofficial FBI contact back when they'd started out (Admittedly, that was because Audrey had been more Matt's friend than a friend of the group as a whole, but she still hated it when that kind of thing happened).

"Sometimes, it can be a good thing to forget," Rivier said simply, before she walked out of the room, leaving Claire to stare silently after her.

_And sometimes_, Claire reflected to herself as she pulled out her datapad and pulled up the first group picture that she and the team had taken- it had taken _ages _to get Hiro, Ando and Micah to stop joking around long enough for them to take the picture-, _you'd give anything not to_.

Her time with Peter had never been easy, but she wouldn't forget it for anything.

If she lost her memory of him…

How long would it be before she became as bad as Adam Monroe?

After all, he'd lived for over three hundred years by the time he tried to commit mass genoicde by tricking Peter into helping him release the Shanti virus; she was already nearly twice that age.

OK, admittedly he'd been a berk even before he'd _learned _about his powers, but he still hadn't thought about doing something on _that _scale at the time; wasn't it possible that, without the influence of people like Peter and Hiro when she needed them, Claire could have ended up being just like Adam by this point?

Shaking such depressing thoughts out of her head- Adam was long since trapped and buried on Earth-That-Was; there was no point thinking about him now-, Claire sat over the datapad and began to tap away at the controls, pulling up the plans of the base that apparently housed 'Subject Alpha' and 'Subject Omega', giving herself something to focus on as she began to think about her plan for the upcoming raid.

She had the essential details all sorted, of course, but after everything she'd seen of the crew…

Well, she'd like to make sure she knew what positions might merit a specific crewmember doing a certain task when the time came for them to infiltrate the base.

* * *

AN: In case any _Heroes _fans are wondering about the 'Adam' reference when I said I was writing this based on events in _Fight or Flight_, take into account that I said future content might be affected by information revealed in the series as further episodes air; to date, nothing in the new episodes blatantly contradicts anything I've written, so from this point on assume everything from _Powerless _onwards to be canon for this story.


	6. From Company to Academy

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

An hour later, the crew of _Serenity _gathered in the eating area, Claire Bennet standing at the head of the table as she looked critically around at them all, her arms folded as she prepared to speak.

"First things first," she stated as she looked around at the people before her. "Forget everything- _everything_- you thought you knew about how River Tam became the way she is."

"What; you mean ignore the fact that she went doo-lally from gettin' all kinds of crap carved into her head-?" Jayne began, only to stop when Claire glared at him, her eyes flicking briefly to the sword on her back before she turned back to the rest of the table.

"To answer Mr Cobb's question, I was _actually _referring to forgetting what you think you knew about how she actually developed her psychic abilities; the Academy was involved, but it wasn't exclusively their doing that made River what she is today," Claire stated simply as she looked over at Simon. "Tell me, Doctor Tam, during your time at medical school, while studying genetics- and you _must _have done; an intelligent man like yourself wouldn't pass up any opportunity to learn something that could be potentially important to a patient's well-being-, did you ever come across reference to the Sureshes?"

"The… Sureshes?" Simon repeated, looking confused for a moment before he nodded uncertainly. "Wait… I _did _read something… they were a father and son team of Indian geneticists back on Earth-That-Was who believed that humanity had made an evolutionary leap of some kind around five or six hundred years ago, right? They made it their life's work for some reason, but they never found any proof of their theories and died without anybody knowing if they were right or if they were just crazy."

"Essentially, yes," Claire confirmed, nodding at Simon, grateful that he'd even found that much about Chandra and Mohinder in the official records; after all the effort she and the others had gone to in order to preserve their friend's work, it was good to know his name was still recorded no matter how small the reference was. The information was fundamentally flawed, of course- the two men had never worked _together _on their research; Mohinder had taken over after Chandra died- but at least she had somebody who knew something about the background of what she was about to relate at least. "What your books _won't _tell you, however, is that they were right; mankind _had _made an evolutionary jump back then, even if it's gone into decline since that time following the Exodus."

For a moment, there was silence throughout the dining area, until Inara leaned forward to look inquiringly at Claire.

"When you say that the human race experienced an… evolutionary jump," the Companion asked, looking uncertainly at Claire, "what do you mean by that?"

"What I mean," Claire explained, "is that, over five hundred years ago, seemingly ordinary people learned that they had the power to achieve things that should have been impossible for human beings to accomplish. One man was able to turn himself completely invisible, another could generate all kinds of radiation along the entire electro-magnetic spectrum, a woman discovered that she could tap into wireless information signals…"

She shrugged. "To put it simply, a percentage of the human population discovered that they had superpowers."

Simon blinked in a clearly stunned manner at that statement.

"I'm sorry; this happened _five centuries ago_?" he said, looking incredulously at Claire. "But… but how could we _not _have heard about it?"

"_That _is where the Academy comes in," Claire replied, smiling grimly as she looked back at Simon. "It's not as recent as you might think; the Academy is actually a 'descendant organisation' of a company that was set up on Earth-That-Was to monitor and control the activities of so-called 'specials', regardless of whether or not those with powers had actually done anything wrong or were planning to do so. It's never been clear what the 'screening process' was- how they selected what to do with each superhuman they tracked down- but the general procedure after the Company had identified and captured active superhumans always involved one of three options; offer them a job working with the Company to hunt others like them, being sent back out with no memory that the abduction had ever occurred with a radioactive tracer in their system, or just killing them.

"Fortunately," she added, noting the crew's concerned looks- evidently they didn't like the prospect of potentially facing people who could do the kind of things that Claire had described-, "following the migration from Earth-That-Was, most of the 'specials' were pretty much de-powered and the genetic potential for others to develop superpowers was practically lost, prompting the entire process to essentially begin again from scratch with some of the less 'impressive' superpowers- enhanced strength or mental abilities without being able to do anything _significantly _impressive like what I told you about earlier. The common theory among those who knew about it was that most of them went to so much effort suppressing their powers during the trip from Earth-That-Was to here to prevent discovery that they essentially turned their powers off at the genetic level."

"Is something like that even possible?" Inara asked, looking inquiringly at Claire. "It seems a bit unlikely to me…"

"The human mind is a remarkable thing, Miss Serra," Claire said simply as she looked over at the Companion. "Don't underestimate what it can do if it has to do it, and these people were desperate to prevent themselves from being regarded as 'freaks' and forced to endure even harsher conditions on the ships than they already did."

After a moment's pause to insure that Inara had understood her point, Claire turned back to address the whole table once more. "Anyway, as a result of the mass suppression of powers, essentially the genetic material for passing powers on began to 'die out' as the powers were no longer used, resulting in the entire evolutionary process essentially having to begin again once humanity had settled on the new worlds over here. From what information my contacts and I have managed to gather from our intermittent attempts to access the Academy database, their research has shown that powers manifested since the exodus are generally limited to purely physical or mental abilities; slightly enhanced strength, improved senses, bodies operating at the peak of physical perfection…"

Here Claire paused and turned to look pointedly at River, thus guaranteeing the rest of the crew would understand what she was saying. "And, of course, telepathic powers that occasionally seem to border on precognition and psychometry."

For a moment, there was a stunned silence as the crew processed the idea that River's powers hadn't _just _been the result of the Academy's tampering with her, and then Jayne broke it.

"Psycho-wha?" he asked, looking in confusion at Claire.

"Pschometry, Mr Cobb, refers to the concept of being able to see things about the person or persons who have handled an object just by touching it," Claire clarified, looking over at the merc in a slightly frustrated manner. "Admittedly, Miss Tam's brand of psychometry appears not to depend on physical contact as much as it has been traditionally portrayed, given that she has been recorded as sensing something about such diverse objects as a ship that had been attacked by reavers without even actually setting foot on the ship in the first place, but nevertheless, she _does _seem to have that particular talent."

"Would her wide range of… abilities… have anything to do with what they did to her amygdala?" Simon asked, looking briefly over at River apologetically before he looked back at Claire. "I mean, with her having lost the ability to filter her emotions…"

"She subsequently lost the ability to filter what information her mental abilities can pick up; good guess, Doctor Tam," Claire finished for him, smiling slightly in approval at Simon. "Indeed, that was the whole reason they stripped her amygdala in the first place; they wanted to see what would happen if a psychic had literally _no _limitations on what she could pick up."

Sighing slightly, she shook her head as she leaned forward and looked pityingly over at River. "It didn't work quite like they wanted though, did it?"

"Traded a laser for a shotgun," River confirmed as she looked back at Claire. "Wider range, but it's less clear; harder to pick up what I'm seeing unless I focus."

"Uh… that why you sometimes don't quite… sound right?" Mal asked, looking slightly awkwardly at River. "Y'know, you're talking about what you're seeing, but since you can't quite make it out you're just translatin' it into something you can understand?"

River smiled over at him.

"Got it in one," she said simply.

"Uh, Miss Bennet?" Kaylee asked, raising a hand as she looked inquiringly at Claire. "I know this isn't my field, but does all that stuff that the Academy did to her include anything different about the rest of her body? I mean, I didn't see much of her in action 'gainst the reavers, but she still couldn't have gone up against that many of them if she didn't have at least _some _kinda enhanced strength, right?"

"Excellent point, Miss Frye," Claire said, smiling slightly over at the mechanic before her expression became more serious once again. "Actually, that part of her abilities is at least partly due to the Academy; having enhanced her mental abilities, they resolved to try and find a means of enhancing her physical ones to match them. Based on my research, it would appear that the Academy had found a way to 'graft' extra superhuman abilities to people who already possess the genetic potential to develop superpowers, based on taking tissue samples from people possessing those specific powers- traditionally samples of brain tissue- and…"

She swallowed slightly, unable to stop the memories that her current statement was bring back to the forefront from briefly overwhelming her before she could continue. "And forcing them to ingest the samples in order for the new abilities to be absorbed into their bloodstream."

Mal blinked in shock.

"Hold on a minute; you're telling me they made River eat bits of people's _brains_?" he said, looking in shock at Claire.

"Well, I can't be sure how they actually forced the matter to enter her system- the specifics of the process have never been entirely clear- but essentially, yes, that's what happened," Claire said, looking apologetically over at River. "I'm sorry to have to be so blunt about this, but-"

"Need to know the truth," River said, nodding reassuringly at Claire as she spoke. "Need to understand that the broken girl isn't the top of the pile; there's someone bigger out there."

"Bigger?" Zoe repeated, looking over at Claire with the closest thing to anxiety that any of the crew had ever seen on her face. "When you say 'bigger'…"

"She refers to the individuals that the Operative's contacts have identified as 'Subject Alpha' and 'Subject Omega', I'm sorry to say," Claire said, looking apologetically over at the crew as she continued. "We have no way of knowing precisely _what _they're capable of right now, unfortunately, but based on what information we've been able to gather, my colleagues are convinced that we're dealing with a couple of Class Five 'specials'."

"I take that…. Class Five is a bad thing?" Simon asked.

"The earliest recorded Class Five had the ability to warp time and space to allow him to travel in time and teleport to anywhere he wanted; trust me, that's a bad thing," Claire stated, looking over at Simon before she looked back at Mal. "However, the important thing to acknowledge about Class Fives is that, while they're the _most _powerful class of 'specials' recorded, that doesn't mean they're _all _powerful; they still have their limitations, but it's just more difficult to exploit them than it is to exploit the weaknesses of normal people-"

"OK, seriously, this is just gettin' _way _too gorram stupid!" Jayne interjected, slamming a hand on the table as he looked at Claire. "None of us could even handle moonbrain in a fight, and you're expectin' us to go up against somebody _tougher _than her?"

"The key factors to consider in that statement, Mr Cobb, is that firstly, we don't know precisely what the Academy's latest pupils can do- they may not have full control of their powers yet- so their powers may only be potentially greater than River's without actually being greater _now_, and secondly, as you pointed out, no _one _of you could hold your own against River in a fight; multiple opponents might be a different matter," Claire pointed out. "If all seven of us rushed her at once, we might manage to put her down; Reavers are deadly, but their inability to think of much of a combat strategy beyond just ripping and tearing limits their effectiveness when going up against someone like River en masse."

"All cats are grey in the dark," River spoke up, looking over at Claire as she nodded in confirmation of the one-time cheerleader's comments. "All identical; no need to focus on one more than others."

"Huh?" Jayne said in confusion. "That don't make no-"

"On the contrary," Zoe said, leaning forward as she looked critically over at Jayne. "It makes _perfect _sense; don't you see? River doesn't need to worry about reading the minds of reavers in a fight because they can't think of a strategy more detailed than 'kill it'. If she was facing multiple opponents working together who could actually think about something more elaborate, she'd… have trouble working out who to focus on, right?" she concluded, looking curiously at River.

River nodded.

"Too many different noises around me; wouldn't be able to pick out who to focus on," she said, confirming what Zoe and Claire had said with a slight smile at the two older women. "Would always know where they were if just fighting a group of free-flyers, but if they were working as a team, wouldn't know who to worry about coming at me next."

"Exactly," Claire said, nodding gratefully at River for confirming her assessment as she turned back to look at Mal. "If we can coordinate our attacks, and try and isolate Subjects Alpha and Omega- going after both of them at once would accomplish nothing, but taking on one at a time increases our chances of success- we should be able to neutralise them and determine how far the Academy's conditioning has gone."

"Conditioning?" Simon asked, raising his hand slightly as something occurred to him. "I thought you said that the Academy's 'ancestor' normally recruited these… specials… willingly; why would they need to use control methods like that now?"

"After a few of their most efficient operatives went rogue, they realised that expecting people to willingly hunt others like them was an exercise in futility at best," Claire clarified. "Plus, of course, after the majority of the founding members were killed by one of their own, the remaining heads were forced to resort to more extreme methods just to keep their organisation going; behavioural conditioning like what was done to River became the only way to guarantee that they wouldn't be betrayed at inconvenient moments."

"OK," Mal said, nodding slightly as he looked at Claire. "Would they be using the same conditioning as was used for River?"

"As in will they be using the same codewords that put River down during the Maidenhead fight?" Claire asked, promptly shaking her head. "The Academy's arrogant, but they're not stupid; these guys won't be using the same codewords they used for the last… 'experiment'."

For a moment, Claire looked as though she was ready to hit something as she spat out the last word- clearly she found the idea of people like River being used as nothing more than experiments as distasteful as the rest of the crew- but the moment passed and she turned her attention back to the crew. "Anyway, that's what we're dealing with; two beings of unknown power levels and an organisation that dates back to Earth-That-Was and has a far greater influence than you ever suspected. If anyone wants to back out after this, simply tell me now and we'll leave it at that; I won't think any less of you."

After a moment's silence as the crew looked around the table at each other, Mal turned back to look inquiringly at Claire.

"You know where these guys are bein' kept?" he asked.

Claire nodded.

"You think we can get in there and get 'em out before the programming's done?"

"There's a good chance, yes," Claire confirmed, nodding at the captain once again.

"And if it turns out to be done when we get there, you still think we've got a chance to rush 'em before they can really fight back?"

"Brainwashing the subjects is good for ensuring loyalty, but it has the disadvantage of limiting their effectiveness if you want them to think on their feet," Claire responded. "We'll be in control of our own thoughts, but they'll be unable to think beyond simply fulfilling their assigned targets; they won't be able to imagine new ways of using their powers against us."

"Good," Mal said, nodding briefly back at her before he looked over at the others. "So, what d'ya all say? Care to misbehave a bit again?"

Jayne smiled.

"We get to be the good guys now?" he said, grinning over at Claire.

"Well, the good guys in the eyes of everyone who doesn't like the Academy and what it's doing to people… which, if the news got out, would admittedly be the majority, so yeah; you'd be the good guys," Claire confirmed.

"Shiny," Jayne said, as he looked back at Mal. "I'm in."

"Think it's safe to say we all are, sir," Zoe confirmed, allowing the rest of the crew to nod in agreement before she looked back at Claire. "So, Miss Bennet, what's the attack plan?"

"Simple enough," Claire replied, pulling a small device out of her pocket and tapping a few buttons as she studied the screen. "Essentially, it goes like this…"


	7. Interlude: The Name of Evil

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: Well, there's still a little while to go before we learn the identities of Subjects Alpha and Omega, but, following my decision to incorporate the events of Season Two into this story, I thought that it was time for at least _one _of the bad guys to make an appearance before I show the crew preparing for their attack on the Academy (As well as showing how River and Claire match up in a fight)

From the Ashes

In a darkened room in a space station that officially didn't exist, a man whose existence was little more than shadow and rumour to around ten percent of the population of this galaxy, utterly unknown to eighty-nine point nine percent of the population, and only known for a fact to exist by the remaining point one percent, stood in a darkened room and studied the screen before him.

If people had known about the sheer range of companies that this man had created were overseen by one man, they might have wondered how he ever managed to cope with the sheer range of tasks that he did on a day-to-day basis. After all, he was the final authority for no less than five of the most powerful organisations currently in existence in this galaxy, and was thus responsible on a daily basis for making numerous decisions that could aid or ruin lives on several planets if he made the wrong choice, and yet, despite everything he had to deal with on a regular basis, he still managed to keep all his employees satisfied.

Of course, he generally preferred it when he was working on projects on the… to put it simply… not-so-legal side of things, but that wasn't to say he didn't put just as much effort in his more legal operations as well. After all, the Academy program was certainly a highly interesting avenue of research into others like himself, to say the least, but it wouldn't even be possible without the finances brought in by his earnings in Blue Sun and other such areas.

It was always tedious having to rely on mere humans to conduct his research, but with his kind having significantly weakened themselves to avoid detection during the exodus, he supposed he should just be grateful that _anybody _still had access to powers after everything they'd gone through.

He just couldn't understand _why _they'd done it; he'd always known that most of the other people in the world with 'abilities' were idiots, but why hadn't they used their powers to establish their authority over the rest of the crews in the ships rather than simply hiding in the shadows? After all, it was hardly like they were going to _execute _anybody inside the ships; they were attempting to rebuild the human race on a different planet, and thus needed every available human being that they could find. If they'd wanted to, he and those like him could have taken complete control of the colony ships during the flight; the only reason he hadn't done so was that he'd doubted even he could hold his own against an entire shipful of people if he'd tried to establish his authority.

He may have been powerful, but against multiple opponents, when all he had to fall back on was himself?

He may have been hard to kill, but it wasn't impossible for him to get tired, and he definitely did _not _want to find out what would happen if he was thrown out of a spaceship into a vacuum, particularly when there wouldn't be anybody to even try and recover his body afterwards.

Still, those days were long behind him now; dwelling on the past would accomplish nothing. As the situation currently stood, he now possessed resources and power like nothing he could have imagined controlling back when he had first began his ascent to power; the fact that he'd had to eliminate a various assortment of 'lesser beings' to accomplish his goal was such an irrelevant matter he barely even thought about it any more.

Plus, with his two latest… acquisitions, for lack of a better term… he was coming ever closer to the moment when he could at last step out of the shadows and claim the authority that was his by right.

No longer would he be forced to skulk in the shadows like he had something to fear from those who were less than him; from this point onwards, _he _would be the one with the power, not the fools whose only authority came from some idiotic political system.

He was superior to any human being in existence; it was time for the world to acknowledge that fact.

"Sir?" a voice said from the door to his office.

Glancing over towards the door, the man smiled as he saw the figure standing there. The man's name was Doctor Mark Denning, and he was the closest thing the man had to a friend in his employ; Denning served as the head of the so-called 'Academy' program, and was one of the few people in the man's employ who knew what he was capable of.

"Yes, Doctor Denning?" the man replied, raising a curious eyebrow. "What's the situation?"

"Well… we've just received news from our surveillance teams tracking Miss Bennet," Denning replied, looking slightly uncomfortably at his superior. "She… well, she's made contact with Captain Reynolds, sir."

The man blinked.

"Captain Reynolds?" he repeated, looking critically at the man before him. "As in, Captain _Malcolm _Reynolds? The man who aided River Tam in releasing the Miranda Wave? The man who convinced our most efficient Operative to defect? The man who practically single-handedly held Serenity Valley until he was ordered to surrender? You have allowed Claire Bennet to make contact with the most dangerous man _alive_?"

"Uh… no disrespect intended, sir, but isn't that a _slight _exaggera-?" Denning began, only to be suddenly interrupted as his superior suddenly drew a sword from its traditional place at the bottom of his desk, the blade being held against his throat in a matter of seconds.

"Be grateful that you have proven your loyalty to me over the years, Denning," the man stated grimly, as he stared resolutely at the man before him. "If you had been anyone else, I would not have hesitated to send this blade the necessary extra few inches required for you to part company from your body."

After a moment's silence to ensure that Denning had absorbed what he had just said, he sat back down and returned to the sword to its customary place.

"However," he continued, as though nothing had happened- after all, why should he deign to explain his motives for his actions to his inferiors-, "you are _not _somebody else, so I shall make this clear to you; since the Miranda Wave was initially broadcast, Malcolm Reynolds has become, to many, the personification of the Independent ideal, and River Tam has become an example of why the Alliance should be opposed. If they join forces with Claire Bennet, they may pose a significant threat to this installation; Subjects Alpha and Omega are efficient, but Alpha's continued resistance to our methods of… persuasion… could be a problem if Reynolds and Bennet mount an assault on this facility."

Denning opened his mouth, clearly about to object to the idea that anyone would dare to attack the Academy, but then he registered the expression on his superior's face and decided to keep his doubts to himself.

"The odds of their success are slim, of course," the man said as he looked at Denning, "but trust me; if there is a way into this facility, Bennet will find it. Step up Subject Alpha's programming sessions, and insure that he and Subject Omega can work together effectively; I wish to be prepared for when the crew of _Serenity _arrive."

"Understood," Denning said, nodding briefly at his employer before he turned around to walk out of the room, leaving his superior alone with his thoughts.

In many ways, he supposed that it was inevitable that he would have to face Miss Bennet again eventually. After all, she had proven to be one of his most resilient opponents from the moment that they had first met right up until the present; the possibility of them never encountering each other was slim to none, given their chosen professions.

Besides, he _had_ to provehis superiority to her if he was ever going to get anywhere in life; she was the only person he'd ever encountered with abilities like his, and he _had _to defeat her if he was going to prove once and for all which of them was the greater of the two.

Admittedly, he had won a _couple _of prominent victories over her, but the fact that she still lived despite all that continued to frustrate him.

_Of course_, he thought to himself, as he spun his chair around to stare at the wall behind him, _I do have a _couple _of trophies of my last couple of victories over her_…

As he pressed a hidden switch located on the side of his chair, the man smirked slightly as a panel in his wall opened, revealing his two most valued possessions, the possessions that he had never permitted even his closest employees to witness.

One was the upper half of an arm, clearly belonging to a young woman, that had been neatly severed from its original owner just above the elbow. He had taken it during his last fight with that group of so-called 'heroes'- why they wasted their lives protecting those who should be their slaves he could never understand-,

The other was the perfectly preserved body of a slightly short Japanese man, his face lined with age and scars even as his body's physique made it clear that he had long remained in excellent shape. It had taken the man who now stared at the body a great deal of time, effort and money to acquire the body before departing from Earth-That-Was, to say nothing of the technology necessary to keep it preserved as well as it had been since then…

But it was worth it.

This man had ruined his plans and his life on the three occasions where they had fought; something that no other person in existence had truly accomplished.

(Admittedly, the girl had done so as well, but she _shared _his own ability; it would only have been expected that she'd have more opportunities to oppose him, even if she was younger than him.)

If he could not triumph over the man before him in life, he could at least do so in death, keeping the body before him as a reminder that he would always triumph in the long term even if his enemies succeeded in the short term.

Pouring himself a glass of his favourite wine- really, wine-making skills had gone significantly into decline since they'd left Earth; he was always grateful that he'd managed to smuggle a few bottles of his favourite brands along on the ships with him when he'd left-, the man known to many as Adam Monroe raised his glass at the long-deceased yet well-preserved body of Hiro Nakamura, a smile on his face as he studied the man who'd three times prevented his attempts to gain the power that was his right.

He only wished that Hiro had lived long enough to see this particular stage of his latest plan; he'd have liked to see that idiotic Japanese fanboy defeat his _latest _soldiers…

* * *

AN 2: OK, if anyone's wondering how Adam acquired Hiro's body- and just to make sure everyone remembers, Hiro just died of natural causes so his body's still totally intact and relatively undamaged-, he basically stole the body after Hiro's funeral and had it cryogenically frozen, subsequently transporting it during the Exodus to the new solar system down among the assorted terraforming tools while keeping it frozen to ensure it would remain in good enough condition for him to gloat over when he got to the new solar system; with the amount of cash he possessed he found it relatively easy to avoid questions about what was down there in the first place. As for how he got out of the grave he was left in at the end of the series, or who the 'soldiers' he's referring to are (Beyond being the ones known as Subjects Alpha and Omega, of course)… you'll just have to wait and see 


	8. Planning Tensions

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: Well, thanks to a comment by TaleWeaver, I've decided to tackle the fate of the one character in _Heroes _whose final demise wasn't mentioned earlier; Noah Bennet, Claire's father, AKA 'HRG'. To any of his fans out there, I apologise for my somewhat negative portrayal of him in this chapter, but I'm just reflecting how I feel about him based on the information we know so far. The man has good intentions when it comes to trying to keep Claire safe, I'll give him that, but the ends _never_ justify the means, and he uses some _very _questionable methods in his attempts to 'protect' his daughter no matter how you look at it

From the Ashes

As she sat in _Serenity_'s main cargo area, casually examining her sword and any other weapons that she might want to use in the upcoming confrontation, Claire allowed herself a slight smile as she took in the sight of the now-familiar walls around her.

She had spent so long staying on the run, trying to avoid the Alliance or the Academy- the Academy may have been an Alliance-funded organisation, but they could still conduct some independent operations if they wanted to- that it was a rare occasion when she was somewhere that she knew that she wouldn't run the risk of being discovered or betrayed (For those in the know, the private little bounty that those members of the Academy who knew about her continued existence had placed on her head could be a _very _tempting prize, and given how far-reaching the Academy's influence could be she could never be entirely certain if anyone around her _was _'in the know' about her criminal status).

In a strange way, right here, on _Serenity_, surrounded by a crew of misfits and wanted war criminals, Claire felt almost safer than she'd felt since she'd left Earth during the exodus.

It was really kind of amusing, in its way; she'd been seen as one of the stereotypically popular crowd back in school, and yet, now that she was an adult, she only ever really fitted in with people who didn't fit in anywhere else.

True, Jayne could be a bit frustrating at times- how often did you have to threaten to castrate a guy before he got the message not to keep flirting with you?-, but him aside, the crew really were a good group of people.

_Some things never change, I guess_, Claire mused to herself as she leaned back against the wall, a slight smile on her face as she looked at the large form of the 'mule' in the centre of the room. _No matter where I go, I'll always end up working on a long-term basis with at least _one _person who gets on my nerves half the time_.

It was kind of ironic, she supposed, that in her first 'team' the person who'd gotten on her nerves the most was her own father, Nathan Petrelli. They'd tried to make an effort to connect with each other, of course, but it hadn't been easy even before Peter had died, and after his loss, it had just become even more difficult for either of them to find some common ground. Hiro, for all his power, had been happy just to be a big kid with her, Micah and Molly Walker in their leisure time, Niki and Matt had served as the stern-yet-fun-loving paternal figures of their group, and Mohinder had generally been something between a close uncle or cousin; occasionally an authority figure providing them with the required information to tackle a current problem, but he'd also been prepared to kick back with them when they'd had time off.

But Nathan…

He'd really been the most reluctant member of the group, when you got down to it; even after he'd accepted the need to use his powers to help people, he'd never really accepted _them_, no matter how much everyone else always asked for his help when the need arose. When push came to shove, the group always knew that they could count on Nathan for help, but when it came to just spending their leisure time with him, after Peter's death they were lucky to see him once a fortnight if they didn't have a crisis on their hands.

Still, Claire supposed that she should be grateful they'd had any kind of decent relationship in the end, particularly given how things had turned out with…

She sighed slightly as she leant forward, the memories that she'd just brought back to mind surging to the forefront of her thoughts once again.

To this day, she had yet to fully forgive herself for how she'd dealt with Noah Bennet, the man who'd raised her as his daughter for as long as she could remember.

In the end, that had been the problem in their relationship; he'd been unable to _stop _seeing her as a daughter. Even when she was surrounded by people who could have helped to keep her safe if the need arose and she had to be protected, Noah Bennet still insisted on doing it himself, regardless of what actions were necessary; as far as he was concerned, if it kept Claire safe, he'd do it, even if Claire wouldn't have wanted him to do it in the first place.

He'd forced Isaac Mendez to take heroin when the guy was trying to quit it, he'd tried to erase Claire's memory of her powers after the Homecoming confrontation between Peter and Sylar, he'd constantly wiped his wife's memories rather than just taking the chance that she could be trusted to keep a secret, he'd been willing to shoot Molly Walker for no greater crime than her power, he'd gone back to work for the Company and abandoned Claire when she'd needed him…

No matter how much she tried to see him as a loving father simply doing the best for his children, a part of Claire still couldn't help but regard him as a manipulative man doing just whatever he felt was best regardless of the consequences for anyone else. She appreciated his concern, of course, but couldn't he have just once asked her what _she _wanted, rather than take all responsibility for her safety onto himself without wondering how she'd react?

Drugging Isaac and threatening to kill Molly had been bad enough, but what he'd done at the end…

He'd tried to hand Hiro over to the Company in exchange for them leaving Claire alone, shortly after she'd made contact with Peter and Nathan following Nathan getting shot at the press conference. They'd claimed that she'd violated her father's agreement by alerting other 'specials' to the Company's recent activities (Even though she'd only told them that she was still alive), and thus demanded either Claire or a 'special' of similar or greater power in order to avoid action being taken against her family, and her father had chosen to capture Hiro, accompanied by an unconscious Haitian (Whose powers apparently still worked even when he wasn't conscious), drugged after he'd refused to aid in Hiro's capture willingly.

No matter how much Claire may have wanted a normal life back then, she was _not _willing to let Hiro pay the price for it, regardless of how little she'd known him at the time.

Her father may have believed it was a fair trade, but that was the way he was; as far as he was concerned, no sacrifice was too great for his 'Claire-Bear' to be safe.

Claire didn't agree.

As far as she was concerned, if the price of her staying free was somebody else being captured, that price was too high.

After asking Molly Walker for directions, she, Matt and Peter had subsequently tracked Hiro down, but in the end Matt and Peter had been forced to go up against the Company's hired goons while Claire went into the holding facility where Hiro was being held captive to get him out.

With the few remaining Company officials already on their way to pick Hiro up from the facility, the Japanese man trapped inside a cell that negated his powers, Peter and Matt otherwise occupied, and Bennet refusing to allow Claire to rescue her friend as this was the only way she'd ever be safe, Claire had been faced with little option as to what option to take.

Trying to get the keys to Hiro's cell away from him she'd hit him- she'd _hit _her _father_- and he'd fallen onto the metal edge of a nearby table, the edge digging into his brain before Claire could take back what she'd done.

She hadn't meant to kill him; she knew that for a fact.

She also knew that, with him dead, there was no longer any obstacle to her, Matt, Peter and Hiro getting out of there before they were discovered.

She couldn't allow the Company to get their hands on her; give them access to her power, and there was no telling what they would do.

She'd dragged Hiro out of his cell, drugged and dazed to insure he didn't even try to escape, helped him walk to where Peter and Matt were waiting for them, and Peter had subsequently teleported them all out of harm's way.

She'd saved her friend at the cost of the man she'd called her father for almost her entire life up to that point.

It hadn't been an easy decision to make, but, if faced with it again, she wouldn't do anything different.

"Does it ever get easier?" River's voice said from off to the side, breaking into Claire's train of thought as she glanced over at where the young psychic currently stood, dressed, as ever, in her simple dress as she stared silently at the immortal former cheerleader.

"Living with the consequences of your actions is always hard," Claire answered, standing up and stretching slightly as she looked at _Serenity_'sonly other 'special'. "It's when it _stops _being hard that you have to worry…"

"About becoming the bad you?" River asked.

Claire chuckled slightly at that; as much as she'd always hated Adam Monroe ever since the day she and him had first met- him cutting off her arm like that _really _hadn't endeared him to her as a person; just because it grew back didn't stop it hurting in the first place-, it was definitely amusing to think of him as 'the bad her'. For a moment she couldn't stop herself picturing Adam as being some dark-haired punk version of her, but then the moment passed and she turned her attention back to the more immediate matter of River's presence.

"Any particular reason you're here?" she asked, standing up to look inquiringly at the psychic.

"Wanted to know you," River replied simply.

Claire blinked in confusion.

"Uh, when you say you want to _know _me, you mean as in…?" she asked, waving a hand promptingly.

"As Seraph knew Neo," River said, spreading her arms wide and raising one hand in front of her, beckoning at Claire with all of her fingers. "I'd apologise, but I think you know what I mean by this anyway."

Despite herself, Claire smiled slightly at the pop culture reference that River must have pulled from her own memory.

Movies may not have totally survived the departure from Earth-That-Was, but it was always comforting to know that some aspects of the more large-scale movies remained alive to this day, even if it was only her who remembered them (She somehow doubted that Adam cared that much about fiction, if he was even still around; he didn't strike her as the type).

"All right then," she said, standing up and cracking her knuckles as she looked at River with a slight smile on her face. "Let's do this, Miss Tam."

* * *

As he stared at the plans before him, Mal was once again reminded of why he'd never wanted to advance particularly far when he'd been in the Independent army; he just did _not _have a head for the complicated infiltration missions. 

Oh, he could come up with decent plans when the need arose, he wasn't denying that, and he could handle most standard security systems, but when it came to having to tackle security systems belonging to the stupidly rich and powerful? He was _so _out of his depth he was practically drowning.

He was just grateful that Claire wasn't relying on him to actually come _up _with a plan right now; she'd just had all these plans drawn up and told them to check over them to see if they spotted something they weren't sure how to tackle, and she'd then fill them in on how she intended to overcome it.

Personally, Mal thought it was a real headache- how were they meant to _know _what she'd have missed?- but, given that this was her mission, he'd figured that, in the end, it was best just to stick to her 'rules' for the moment.

Of course, if he felt that he had a problem with her full plan after she'd disclosed it to them- specifically, if it involved anybody having to die as a 'distraction' to let the others through-, Mal and Bennet were going to have _words_.

"OK," he said, leaning over the plans before him, copied out by Simon- say what you like about the doc, he had _very _good drawing skills when you wanted plans; portraits still weren't somethin' he could do, but plans were fine- from the data that Bennet had given them on her little pocket computer (And he wished he knew where she'd picked up something like that; thing seemed to have far more memory space than something that size should). "What've we got on this thing?"

"Well," Zoe said, looking up at Mal where she and Kaylee were currently leaning over the plans as they were spread out across the table, "firstly, this ain't gonna be as straightforward as getting into Niska's Skyplex; that guy may've been dangerous, but he mainly counted on his rep to stop somebody goin' after him in the first place rather than setting somethin' up to deal with them when they got in."

"Meanin'… what?" Jayne asked, looking curiously at Zoe.

"Meaning that, unlike Niska, this piece of _go su_ actually has automated defence systems inside the damn corridors," Zoe clarified, looking despairingly at Jayne.

"Motion detectors, laser security nets, the occasional automatic machine gun, big metal doors… you name it, these guys have it," Kaylee sighed, looking apologetically up at Mal as she studied the plans. "Gettin' into the place isn't the problem- we could probably use the same method we used to get onto the Skyplex the first time around- but with all this stuff practically eager to shoot at us no matter where we enter, actually gettin' through the corridors is goin' to be a _lot_ harder."

"Gettin' through them to where?" Jayne put in, looking critically over at Kaylee. "Don't reckon there's much point in just chargin' in and blowin' stuff up."

Mal blinked.

"Did you just admit that there _wouldn't _be a point to blowin' something up?" he asked, looking at the mercenary with a slightly amused grin on his face. "Never thought I'd hear _that_…"

"Hey, don't get me wrong, I'm all in favour of blowin' stuff up; just occurs to me that Miss Slice'n'Dice wouldn't have brought us in if that was all she wanted," Jayne pointed out; he'd taken to calling Claire 'Miss Slice'n'Dice' due to her habit of often threatening to cut off at least one of his body parts whenever he made an inappropriate comment of some sort.

"True," Zoe admitted, nodding briefly at Jayne before she turned back to the plans before her. "Key thing to remember here, though, is that there's still those Subjects the Operative told us about to take into account; there's a good chance they're on the station, and if they are, Bennet wants 'em helped if they can be helped."

"Ah," Jayne said simply, before he glanced back at Mal again. "Jus' to make sure, she _did _say that these suckers're meant to be deadlier than Moonbrain in a fight, right?"

"She did," Mal confirmed, wondering what point his crew's resident merc was trying to make.

"Well, if they can't be helped- hell, if they don't _want_ to be helped-, what are we meant to do to them?" Jayne pointed out, leaning forward to look critically at Mal. "Do ya seriously buy that explanation Bennet gave us about how we could take our _current _jumped-up would-be assassin out if we all attacked her with a single clear strategy that we all stuck to in the fight? Even if it's true, how can we come up with somethin' that lets us survive a tussle with people who could do… hell, if she's right about that whole 'evolved human' crap, we could be facin' _anything_!"

Mal groaned.

"Look, we've never thought that it'd be easy to take this place down, Jayne," he said grimly as he looked around at his crew. "Bennet just said that it'd be-"

Before he could continue, Simon suddenly appeared in the door leading to the main hanger of the ship, his eyes wide as he looked at the rest of the crew before him.

"You _have _to come and see this!" he said, looking at the rest of the crew with a clear expression of disbelief on his face. "It's… it's… well, you won't believe it unless you see it!"

"See what, Simon?" Kaylee asked, looking in confusion at her lover.

"River's _fighting _with Bennet!" Simon responded, shock evident as he looked desperately around at the rest of the crew. "And Bennet's actually _holding her own_!"

"_WHAT_?" the rest of _Serenity_'s crew yelled, all four of them instantly leaping to their feet and hurrying out of the living area to join Simon staring at the scene before them.

Sure enough, there in the centre of the cargo hold, Claire Bennet and River Tam were currently locked in single combat, the two of them ducking and weaving around each other as they exchanged blows at such a rapid rate it was practically impossible to see which one of them was better in the current fight than the other. Mal vaguely thought that he saw Claire duck under a kick from River even as she launched her own punch at the other woman's chin (God, _why _did he have to start thinking of River as a woman?). The attack only seemed to graze the tip of River's nose as she leant back out of harm's way, but it was still clear that Claire had come remarkably close to making contact with a woman who'd fought off a mass of Reavers without sustaining even a scratch.

It was official; Bennet was definitely _good _at this kind of thing.

* * *

"Whoa…" Jayne whispered, voicing the thoughts of everyone watching as River literally bent over backwards to avoid a spinning kick from Claire that would hit her in the head, simultaneously grabbing Claire's leg and hurling her to the left even as she rose to stand once again; Claire only just managed to adjust her 'flight' and land on the ground before she would have struck the wall head-first (Mal made a puzzled-yet-concerned note of that last move of River's; it looked a bit too violent for a supposedly friendly match). "Can you _believe _this…?" 

"I have to agree with you there, Jayne," Inara's voice suddenly broke in from off to the side; evidently she had heard the commotion of the fight from her shuttle and come to join them. "Miss Bennet's combat abilities are certainly impressive; she seems to be combining several styles into one, as far as I can tell."

"You know about combat styles?" Zoe asked, looking over at the other woman with a slightly surprised look in her eyes.

"Part of training requires Companions to be aware of how to defend ourselves if our clients turn… ugly, shall we say," Inara clarified as Claire rammed her fingertips into River's chest just under her ribcage, momentarily winding River. "Naturally, we received visits from several prominent hand-to-hand fighters so that they could demonstrate flaws in certain techniques; you tend to remember some things after an experience like that even if you don't actually use them yourself."

"Ah," Zoe said, nodding simply before she turned her attention back to the sight before them.

She had to admit, she had no real idea how Miss Bennet was holding her own against someone who could go up against a whole roomful of Reavers and walk out totally unharmed, but the woman was definitely good at what she did; no question about that, as far as she was concerned. She'd seen her share of combat, of course, but these two could somehow turn a bloody showdown into something that almost resembled a dance and really make it _work_. Even as she watched, Claire and River each simultaneously ducked aside from a punch that could have struck the other directing under the ribcage, leaving them winded and incapable of further action for a few seconds.

Much to everyone's surprise, Claire recovered first, kicking out at River's knee and nearly knocking her over, only for the traumatised genius to seemingly instantly recover and launch a punch towards Claire's face. Just as it looked as though River would deliver the knockout blow, she halted her fist seemingly as soon as she touched the blonde's nose, the two of them instantly freezing for a second before River stepped back, smiling gratefully at Claire.

"You're good," she said simply.

"Same to you," Claire replied, smiling slightly at the younger woman. "Trust me; Matt couldn't have done better at knowing what I was doing there at the end."

"Matt?" Jayne yelled down inquiringly, prompting Mal and Zoe to exchange frustrated glances with each other even as Claire and River looked up at them.

* * *

"Tell me," Claire said after a moment's silence, looking up at the crew with a slight smile on her face as she spoke, "how long have you been standing there?" 

"Uh… not _that _long; just enough to see the last, oh… coupla minutes?" Kaylee answered, smiling slightly at Claire as she spoke. "Anyway, sorry Jayne just brought it up like that, but it's a fair question; who's Matt?"

"Oh, just… somebody I knew with telepathic abilities a while back," Claire answered, smiling slightly up at _Serenity_'s crew as they walked down to join the others. "He wasn't much of a fighter at first, but he became pretty good at using his abilities in a hand-to-hand situation before he died during an… incident."

"What kinda 'incident'?" Jayne asked, looking inquiringly over at Claire.

"The kind I don't _really _want to talk about, Jayne; that good enough for you?" Claire retorted, glaring over at the merc before she turned back to look at Mal, raising an inquiring eyebrow. "So, have you all had the opportunity to look over the plans I sent you yet?"

"Yep," Mal replied, nodding briefly before he glared slightly at Claire. "Just one thing I don't get; how the _hell _do you expect us to avoid pretty much gettin' slaughtered the second we even _try _to get onto that thing?"

"Oh, that part's simple enough," Claire said, smiling slightly at Mal's suddenly bemused expression. "I've got a few tricks up my sleeve when it comes to the security systems, but I just need to know if you can take out any guards he might send along, as well as deal with, oh, maybe around ten, twenty percent of the defences mentioned in those plans?"

Mal blinked.

"You think you can shut down _that _much of 'em?" he asked, looking somewhat incredulously at the young woman before him.

Claire shrugged.

"I've picked up a few things to do with technology over the years; I know my way around computer systems like this," she said casually, trying to sound more confident than she felt. She knew that Micah had given her Device- she'd never come up with a better term for it, given the sheer variety of functions it seemed to possess, so she just called it the Device for convenience's sake- the ability to hack computer systems back when he'd first created it, but it had been so long since she'd used that function that she couldn't be entirely sure whether it had been upgraded along with everything else.

"Trust me," she continued, smiling reassuringly at Mal as she indicated the stairs that would take them back up to the main dining area, "just give me a few minutes of your time, and I'll fill you in on exactly how I intend to get us in there _without _anyone needing to get shot in the process."


	9. On the Approach

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

A few days later, as _Serenity _moved into position to make its move towards the satellite facility that, according to all available files, was the current location of the infamous 'Subjects Alpha and Omega', the entire crew found themselves going over their available weapons to select the most appropriate arsenal for the assault that they were currently planning.

"Right then," Jayne said grimly, as he tossed the last of his large personal arsenal on the table before him, looking inquiringly at the rest of the crew as he spoke, "that's everythin' I got that's even close to bein' able to do damage in this kinda situation; any preferences?"

Claire shook her head.

"I'm a simple sort of person when it comes to getting into a fight, Mr Cobb," she said, as she indicated the sword that was once again strapped to her back. "Generally this is all I need when the fighting starts-"

"And what if they start shootin' you?" Mal countered, looking critically at the blonde woman. "What're you gonna do, deflect 'em with the sword and hope for the best? You know your stuff, I'll admit that much- Operative struck me as the kind of guy who doesn't give out respect easily- but if you're goin' in there, you're takin' a gun. Dong ma?"

For a moment Claire simply stared silently at Mal, weighing up the pros and cons of taking another weapon- it had been so long since she'd worked with a team, she'd become much more comfortable with relying only on her healing ability and her hand-to-hand skills than her ability with long-range weapons-, but finally she relented and picked up a couple of pistols from the table, equipped with shoulder holsters that allowed her to wear them under her coat and keep them hidden until she was ready to use them. They were large enough to have a decent amount of ammunition in each of them, but not so large that they'd unnecessarily hamper her movement if things came down to hand-to-hand and she wanted to use her usual combat strategy.

All she needed to do was remember not to get shot _too _badly- she tended to get a bit complacent around gunfire given how difficult it was to kill her these days; she'd need to remember to be careful this time around-, and she'd be fine. She didn't think the crew of _Serenity _would turn against her if they found out what she could do, of course- after they'd spent so long working with River, it was clear they didn't regard a little detail like being different from the average human as being anything to be bothered about-, but…

Despite herself, Claire sighed slightly wistfully as she strapped the pistols on.

After spending so long either hiding or on the run, it was nice to spend time with people who just thought she was a well-trained human rather than anything remarkable. She knew that there was nothing wrong with what she was, of course, but with people like her becoming increasingly hard to find as the human race spread out across the multiple planets in this area, it was rare to find some people who treated her like one of them as easily as the crew of _Serenity _had accepted her.

Even as a part of her knew that deceiving them like this would come back to haunt her later on, another part of her just wanted to take this opportunity to enjoy the company of others without having to worry about whether or not they knew or cared about her abilities.

She'd cross the metaphorical bridge of how they'd react to her secret when the time came for her to deal with it; right now they were coming up on their target, and she had two high-level specials to rescue.

"Thanks," Mal said, nodding briefly at her before he turned his attention back to the rest of the crew. "We've only got a few minutes before we begin, so this's our last chance; everyone clear on what they're doin' when we get on board that thing?"

"Crystal, sir," Zoe said, nodding briefly at her old commander before she looked over at the rest of the crew. "Anyone want a recap?"

As she turned to look at the rest of _Serenity_'s crew around the table, Claire noted- with a slight smile on her face- that Kaylee and Simon looked like they wouldn't mind a confirmation of what they were meant to do right now, but seemed reluctant to admit it. Fortunately for them, River casually raised a hand, smiling broadly at the captain as he stood at the top of the table; evidently, Claire noted, she'd sensed that some people were uncomfortable about admitting they'd lost track of the fine details of the plan

"Right then," Mal said, stepping forward to stand at the head of the table as he looked on at his crew before him. "Plan's simple; River pilots us into the ship without anybody noticing, Bennet does her techno-thing to shut down the defences once we're on board, and then she, Zoe, Jayne, River an' me head out to try and track down these 'Subjects' Alpha an' Omega while Kaylee, 'Nara an' the doc remain on the ship to keep it secure; don't want anybody tryin' to blow it up while we're busy, an' you can defend the damn thing easily enough so long as you trap 'em in a funnel and don't let them use their numbers against you. Whatever happens after that depends on what kinda condition these two subjects of theirs are in; if they're saveable, we save 'em. If not…"

He looked grimly over at Claire. "Hope you get that we're not goin' to let _another _potential weapon on board; River was one thing, but if these guys are half as powerful as you think an' anything like as uncontrollable as she was at the beginnin'…"

Claire could only nod in acceptance of that comment. As much as she might want to bring whoever the Company had captured back to whoever they'd been before their abduction, the possibility was all too great that they'd been under Company control for so long that they'd lost all significant traces of their former identities.

If that was the case, she'd _have _to kill them; there would be no other way to prevent the chaos they could cause if they got out into the 'verse, if their power level was even half of what the available evidence suggested it would be.

She didn't like having to do it, but the Company's more extreme methods of control after such members as Claude Raines and the Haitian had defected meant that it was sometimes the kindest thing that she could do to them.

"Right then," Mal said, looking over at River as he spoke. "Let's move on out, li'l albatross; we've got a base to break into."

As the crew stood up from the table and turned to walk towards their respective destinations, Claire was probably the only person to notice the brief grin on River's face at Mal's nickname for her. It was an odd thing to find joy in, of course, but Claire felt she was hardly one to judge; she'd put up with Noah Bennet calling her his 'Claire-bear' until a few months before she'd had to kill him without much complaint. At least an albatross sounded a bit cooler; bears may be scary in the wild, but teddy bears were just too common for the image of real bears to be the first thing to spring to your mind after hearing that nickname originally.

It was just a pity that Mal and River were both afraid (Each in their own way, of course) to go any further with their relationship; Mal was practically terrified (As much as a man like him could _get _terrified, of course) of being thought of as a pervert if people knew how he felt about River, and River herself was reluctant to push Mal because she didn't feel like she deserved someone to care about her like that, given the mess she had become as a result of the Alliance's tampering.

It was rather beautiful, really; the Independent war hero saving the Alliance's greatest crime from her own darkness through nothing more radical than loving her for who she was.

If only both of them would see past the little details that they kept on obsessing over right now, they could be _incredible _together…

_Just like Peter and me would've been_, Claire thought wistfully, her thoughts once again inevitably drifting back towards the face of the love of her possibly eternal life, even as her body automatically continued to prepare for the upcoming battle.

She wasn't sure she'd _ever _reach the point where she'd feel that she and Peter would have been anything less than perfect together if society's stupid morals and their even more frustrating biological connection hadn't gotten in the way. He'd been so caring… so dedicated to helping people even when he hadn't been able to find anyone to help him when he'd first learned what he was… so willing to risk his life for people even after they'd ignored his own requests for assistance (Him going to such great lengths to rescue that 'Claude' guy after the Company found him again sprung to mind; even after Claude had left him to fend for himself, Peter had still gone to great lengths to save the invisible man's life after he'd been caught by his old bosses)… simultaneously the most powerful being on the planet and the most vulnerable man she'd ever known…

She still found it practically impossible to believe that the infamous Simone had ever chosen the recovering addict Isaac Mendez over Peter, even though she tried to remember that her information about the participants was only second-hand and she'd never met either of them herself. She didn't doubt that Isaac had been a decent guy- Hiro had certainly seemed to like him based on the time they'd spent together after Hiro first arrived in New York-, but picking him over Peter just didn't make _sense _to her…

Then she felt the slight shudder as _Serenity _moved into position to begin its approach towards the space station, and Claire forced such thoughts out of her mind as she pulled the Device out of her pocket and began to anxiously study its screen, waiting for the opportunity to hack into the station's computer system.

Searching for precisely where Subjects Alpha and Omega were located would doubtless attract too much attention- the Operative's contacts had only been able to provide them with a basic idea of the lab's location on the plans before the connection had been 'terminated'-, but if she simply implemented a quick shut-down program for the internal defence system, the sheer suddenness of the program being activated should keep everyone inside the facility off-balance long enough for them to mount the assault before everything could get back up and running.

_Particularly_, Claire mused to herself as she pulled up the options for the Device that included computer virus infection, _if I do _this _to their systems in the process_…

* * *

As Mal, Zoe and River sat in _Serenity_'s cockpit, staring resolutely out at the sight before them, Zoe couldn't help but be briefly reminded of the last time she'd done something like this. 

There were differences, of course- they'd been going up against a crook rather than the government, and they'd been rescuing somebody that they actually _knew _rather than a couple of people that they didn't know about and may not even be in a condition _to _be saved in the first place- but the essential details at least remained the same; they were breaking into a secure facility to break out people who had been imprisoned for no reason other than the owner of the satellite didn't like them

She'd gone to war to try and preserve people's right to choose for themselves; the fact that she'd lost that particular war was no reason for her not to keep trying to keep people free.

"So," she said as she glanced over at her two allies, the ship now drifting slowly but surely towards the station, the power down and the radio jamming system Wash had used for their last attempt at this stunt broadcasting through the air, "what do you two make of Bennet?"

"Something about her set you off?" Mal asked, looking inquiringly over at his first mate. He'd never put much faith in people's claims to have 'feelings' about other people before he'd met River- it was kind of hard _not _to believe when you saw what she could do- but even before he'd encountered the young psychic, he'd always respected Zoe's knack for knowing whether or not people were keeping something secret from the rest of them.

"Not exactly…" Zoe said uncertainly. "'Least, not in the negative sense."

"In what way?" Mal asked, raising an inquiring eyebrow at his old friend.

"Well, she's definitely not told us everythin', but she's not kept back anythin' that could help us deal with this situation," Zoe replied, as she looked over at River as though seeking confirmation of what she was saying. "It's like… she's honest enough, but she's keepin' somethin' back about this situation."

"Any ideas what?" Mal asked curiously.

For a moment Zoe stared reflectively at the sight of the space station before them, as though the station before them might provide some information about their mysterious new ally, but finally she simply shook her head as she looked back at her captain.

"Nothin', unfortunately," she said apologetically. "It's probably not important, anyway; just can't shake the feelin' that there's somethin' big she hasn't told us…"

"The cheerleader has a right to her secrets like everyone does," River said briefly, as she looked back at Mal and Zoe. "She learned from a true hero when to tell people about herself and when she shouldn't; she'll let you know if there's anything about her that you need to know."

Mal blinked.

Why did River _always _have to do something like that at the worst moment? Just when they thought they had everything sorted, she went and came out with some kind of freaky statement like that and threw everything they thought they knew about the situation out of whack…

"What's that mean?" he asked, looking inquiringly over at the young psychic. "What's Bennet got to do with 'the cheerleader'?"

"Names can change but the souls will always remain the same," River replied, her eyes still fixed on the station before her, her eyes narrowed as she prepared to activate the seal that would allow them to access the station airlock. "The cheerleader saved the world back then, and she continues to try and do the same ever since; failures only increase her resolve to succeed, and success can only breed further success."

After exchanging a brief uncertain glance with Zoe- just enough to confirm that she wasn't sure what River was talking about either-, Mal turned back to look inquiringly at the Alliance's former attempt to create a living weapon once again.

"Uh… are you _talkin_' 'bout Bennet here?" he asked uncertainly.

River simply shook her head.

"Said too much," she said simply, before turning to look at Mal with the same resolved expression that Zoe remembered from when River had been preparing to attack the Reavers back at Mr. Universe's home. "You'd better get down; we're nearly there."

Neither Mal or Zoe argued; River might still be a bit less than lucid at times, but they all knew her well enough by now to know when she was having her better moments, and she was clearly experiencing one of them at the moment.

_Say what you like about River_, Zoe reflected with a slight smile as she and Mal headed down to the main hold, _when she knows what she wants, ain't anything that can stop her from gettin' it_.

* * *

AN: And next chapter, the moment you've all been waiting for; the crew break into the facility, and we finally learn the _true _identities of Subjects Alpha and Omega… 


	10. Subjects Unmasked

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As Claire saw Mal and Zoe come down from the cockpit to join the rest of the crew in the hold, she allowed herself a slight smile as she checked her pistols for ammunition one more time; she'd loaded a significant amount of ammunition into her coat pockets to limit the possibility of her running out during the raid (Spread out around her various pockets to limit the possibility of excess weight anywhere slowing down her movements), but she still wasn't entirely used to relying on anything other than her sword when things got ugly.

"Comin' up on the target," Mal said briefly as he looked around at the rest of the group; as when they'd prepared themselves for the raid on Niska's stronghold, Jayne was practically laden down with weapons, while Kaylee and Simon simply held more conventional smaller firearms. Inara, as when they'd fought off the Reavers at Mr Universe's facility, was using a large, specially-designed longbow as her weapon of choice (Mal personally thought she was just gorram insane; seriously, sayin' that guns were beneath her was all OK in normal situations, but arrows against psychopaths with superpowers? Give him a gun any day; hell of a lost faster against the kind of whackos they seemed to run into on a day-to-day basis…). "Y'all ready?"

"As we'll ever be," Claire replied briefly, nodding at Mal as she spoke.

"I've got the infirmary ready in case the… Subjects… need any treatment," Simon added, looking over at Mal as the captain took up his position at the front of the assault force. "I've laid out a few of the drugs I used to stabilise River back in her worse days, in case they've done something similar to these people, as well as the usual post-raid drugs and equipment."

"Bandages and painkillers, huh?" Mal asked, raising an eyebrow as he smiled slightly at the ship's medic.

"As always," Simon replied with a brief nod.

"Right then," Mal said, as he turned his attention back towards Claire, "you're up now, Bennet; time to do your techno-thing and shut down the defences. Just hope you know what you're doing…"

* * *

"Trust me, Captain," Claire smiled, as she pulled the Device out of her pocket and began to access the station's security system, "you want something electronic taken out, you're not going to find a better tool for the job than this; the man who built it was an absolute genius when it came to technology."

"Really?" Kaylee asked, looking at Claire with an inquiring smile. "Where's he now?"

"Six feet under, unfortunately," Claire replied briefly, smiling slightly at Kaylee's briefly dejected expression- to say nothing of the brief relief that flashed across Simon's face in the process- before she raised a hand to halt any further questions while continuing to tap away at the controls on the Device with the other. "Don't ask me for more information right now, please; I'll be grateful to answer any questions later, but right now it's hard enough trying this as it _is_ without you talking to me…"

Nodding briefly, Kaylee subsequently remained silent, although the eager gleam in her eyes as she studied the Device was all Claire needed to know that this particular matter was far from over (Not that she wouldn't mind the opportunity to talk about Micah, of course; she liked being able to pass on stories about the best people she'd ever known to others, even after they'd been dead for so many years, as a way of giving them their own form of immortality). Pushing those thoughts to the side, Claire focused on the task in front of her, rapidly pressing buttons as she studied the screen before her. She was almost within range of the target… it was just a few more moments to go… another few vital firewalls to penetrate…

Then the three most beautiful words in a hacker's language- 'Security System Disabled'- appeared on the Device's screen, and Claire almost couldn't stop herself from punching the air in glee; even if she didn't exactly look it, she was over six hundred years old by now, and she was _not _going to start acting like a giddy schoolgirl who'd got a date for the prom (Although, now that she thought about it, she hadn't _had _a date for the prom; she'd actually missed most of her prom due to them having to stop the distribution of a 'cure' for their condition created from the Haitian's blood that would have killed a significant percentage of the 'Special' population).

"I'm in the systems," she said, looking over at the crew with a broad smile on her face. "And…"

She paused for a moment to tap the necessary command into the Device, and then spread her arm with a slight flourish as the doors to the space station opened before her; she'd had to slightly tap into _Serenity_'s systems to get the door open at this end, of course, but she felt that the extra drama was worth the oh-so-slight effort such a feat had required.

"We're in," she said simply.

None of her new crew needed to hear anything after that; as though her words were a pre-arranged signal, Mal, Zoe, Jayne and River all charged through the door, weapons blazing as they took out the few guards located in that part of the satellite, the group clearly functioning as a well-oiled team of attackers. Claire wasn't entirely surprised to note that Mal and River were each taking particular care to watch the other's back while simultaneously trying to avoid drawing attention to it; really, the similarities between her and Peter back in the day were so uncanny it was almost _ridiculous_…

_Ridiculous, of course, up to the point where it reminds me of what I've lost_, Claire thought to herself, unable to restrain the familiar wince of pain as she remembered the loss of the man who'd meant so much to her and who she'd never been able to express that love to.

Shaking such thoughts out of her head, she checked her weapons once more and hurried out after her new allies, leaving Kaylee, Inara and Simon to guard _Serenity _until they had accomplished their current mission. As she hurried into the corridors of the satellite, she quickly pulled out the Device and called up the map of the satellite's interior once again, and was relieved to note that, so far, all the systems had indeed been deactivated by the virus she'd entered into the system earlier.

It was official; Micah's powers just became more and more impressive with age. Even afterhe'd been dead for over half a millennium, his last little gift to her just _refused _to stop impressing her when it came to tackling the technical jiggery-pokery, and _God_ she had watched far too much science-fiction with Hiro when it had been reduced to the two of them and Micah in the old days…

"_Get down_!" a voice suddenly yelled from off to the side, Claire barely having time to register who had just spoken before Zoe shoved her out of the path of oncoming gunfire; she'd been so caught in her old memories of the few leisure moments she'd spent with her last couple of friends in the original group that she'd forgotten that she was still in a dangerous situation.

Shaking her head in a self-critical manner, Claire reached into her holsters, pulled out a pistol, and fired a couple of quick shots at the men who had just fired at her, striking them both in the chest- they weren't even wearing body armour; either their opponents didn't think the soldiers here would need it or they just hadn't cared enough to spend that amount of money- and sending them collapsing to the ground. She could have easily managed two well-placed head shots even on her worst day, of course, but she didn't particularly want to attract any more attention to herself by being too precise; her aim may come from years of training rather than artificial programming like what River had endured, but it still wasn't something she was keen on having to explain to the crew at a time like this.

"Thanks," she said finally as she turned to look at Zoe, only for the grateful smile to fade as she saw Zoe staring coldly at her.

"What the hell is _wrong _with you, _chwen_; did you go totally _shiang jing_somewhere along the line?" _Serenity_'s first mate asked, glaring slightly at Claire in a frustrated manner (Claire had to remind herself that Zoe was simply naturally assuming that she was the older one here based on her physical appearance and didn't _mean _to insult Claire's far greater experience in combat; spending so long watching people die tended to give you a shorter temper at times). "We're in a major firefight here, and you're goin' around with your head in the clouds? Got a death wish or somethin'?"

For a brief moment, Claire was tempted to respond with 'Something'- after all, an inability to really die in the first place _would _account for her complacent attitude right now- but decided against it.

"Sorry about that; it's been a little while since I've been in this kind of situation," she said, before offering her new friend a reassuring smile as she noticed Zoe's suddenly sceptical expression; clearly she was wondering at the wisdom of having somebody join them on something like this when they were apparently out of practice. "Don't worry, I could shoot five of these idiots down before they even had time to draw their guns; even if those idiots had managed to fire, I would have been fine."

Given the sceptical look that remained on her face after that statement, Zoe clearly doubted the Claire was being totally honest with her about that, but nevertheless seemed to accept her explanation as Mal, River and Jayne hurried back from further along the corridor to join them.

"We got through the first line of guards, but the door to what that map says is the main research area's shut, an' it ain't opening up any time soon," Mal said, looking briefly over at Claire as he spoke. "Don't suppose that techno-thingy of yours would be able to get us through that particular hurdle, would it?"

"That 'techno-thingy' happens to be a constantly-updating marvel of technology; you could at least show it some _respect_, Captain Reynolds; I'd appreciate it if you showed it some respect," Claire stated, glaring briefly at him before she shook her head and smiled slightly at him. "But… well, let's go and I'll see what I can do, shall I?"

With that said, she walked past the rest of the group and began to walk along the corridor before her, _Serenity_'s crew close behind her as they kept their weapons raised, studying their surroundings in case of further attacks.

Despite her hatred of all things Company/Academy-related, Claire had to admit that they continued to be fairly impressive when they wanted to be. Now that she wasn't occupied with her thoughts or looking out for guards, she could take more time to appreciate the work that had gone into her surroundings; with the security systems disabled, it really didn't look that bad.

However, the effect was significantly ruined by the fact that the metal walls, no matter how elaborately they were decorated, reminded her somewhat of that 'Haitian-style' cell they'd used to try and contain Sylar and Peter (The 'Haitian pills' they'd made him take after the events of Kirby Plaza were more effective, but the need for him to take them willingly meant that they were far from being a reliable means of controlling him when he was being held captive).

Fortunately, the 'Haitianium'- as Hiro had called it at one point; none of them had ever come up with anything better, so they continued to call it that for convenience's sake- only seemed to cover one wall, which at least reinforced the idea that they were in the lab where Subjects Alpha and Omega were being kept- nobody would want to risk two people as powerful as those two were rumoured to be being able to use their powers-, but virtually guaranteed that Claire wouldn't be going into the rooms. The Haitianium had never been totally effective at suppressing her healing ability in the past- Mohinder had theorised that it was because her ability was constantly 'on' while others had to make a conscious decision to use their powers; since she couldn't turn her power off normally the Haitianium wasn't able to do it either-, but given that it had been over five centuries since she'd last encountered any of it, she wasn't going to take any chances that the stuff had been improved over the years; she'd just have to stay at the door of the room as much as possible and hope for the best.

Finally, they reached the door- another Haitianium construction, Claire noted; these guys clearly didn't take any chances in their work- with a keypad on either side of it and clearly securely locked to contain whoever or whatever was on the other side.

Examining the locks, Claire shook her head slightly as she pulled out the Device.

"These guys _really _don't seem to put much effort into keeping things secure," she said, sounding almost pitying as she began to tap away at the controls on the Device with a slight smile on her face.

"_Simple_?" Jayne repeated, looking over at her incredulously. "What the hell d'ya mean,_ simple_?"

"Look at the system here; they're not even using alternating command codes to make the door that _difficult_ to hack," Claire explained, smiling slightly as she continued to tap at the Device. "I mean, theoretically you could get through this thing just by entering every possible four-digit combination in existence until you hit the right combo; it's really childishly simple to hack it with a simple brute force approach, when you get down to it."

"'Simple'?" Jayne repeated, looking at Claire incredulously as numbers ran over the screen on the Device at such a rapid rate that Claire could barely process one before another one was showing. "What are you, a gorram math genius on top of everythin' else?"

"You pick up a lot of knowledge if you're willing to take the time to do so, Mr Cobb," Claire said simply as more and more of the numbers for the codes that were all that stood between them and their targets appeared on the screen of the Device. "My point is, they don't seem to have taken that much effort to make this place hard for a real expert to get into…"

Her voice trailed off as she glanced over at Mal, the implications of her statement clear.

"They _want _us to go inside there?" Mal said, indicating the door with his pistol as he looked sceptically at Claire. "And you _still _want to go in there?"

"I've always felt that the only way to tackle a trap is to spring it, Captain Reynolds; if nothing else, if you _know _it's a trap, you can sometimes turn it to your advantage," Claire clarified, smiling over at the captain in a reassuring manner as the last few numbers slid into position on the Device's screen. "After all, if we _know _we're expected, it's not like taking us by surprise is going to be an entirely practical possibility; just so long as we stay alert, we'll be fine."

Jayne opened his mouth as though he was about to say something, but Claire cut him off. "No, River _won't _be able to give us advanced warning; her psychic abilities will most likely be weakened or shut down the second we enter this room. Its walls are composed of a rare material that negates the abilities of most superhumans who enter it; it takes a great deal of effort to overcome its effect, and River…"

She paused for a moment, as though trying to think of a better way to say what she was about to say, before she turned and looked at River apologetically. "Well, to be frank, you can't really concentrate enough to get through it."

"Understood," River said, clearly unconcerned about Claire's statement. "Stay alert with the other senses and don't trust the gift; easy."

Claire didn't bother responding to that last comment of Claire's as the door opened before them, revealing a large room that resembled a combination between a science laboratory and a training room. Tables on one side of the room were equipped with straps that made their intended purpose of holding someone down clear to even the most casual observer, with scientific and medical equipment gathered around them that made even Mal's inexperienced eye wince, while the other side was clearly dedicated

"Odd set-up," Jayne said at last as he took in his surroundings.

"Empty, too," Mal noted, glancing over at an increasingly-confused Claire as she looked around herself. "Any ideas where they've gone?"

"I was _sure _our contact said they were here…" Claire whispered trying not to show her anxiety as she took in the empty room around her; if she started to panic, she would be _serious _trouble…

"You know," a voice said from behind the group, making Claire's blood run cold as soon as it reached her ears, "if I wasn't actually _trying _to be inconspicuous this time around, I might take offence at that."

It had been over five hundred years since she'd last heard that voice, but Claire would _never _forget the voice of the first man she'd ever met who wanted to kill her.

"_Sylar_?" she half-yelled, half-screamed as she spun around to face her first ever enemy, her eyes wide with shock as she took in the man once known as Gabriel Gray as he stood nonchalantly against the wall beside the door they'd just entered by, his arms folded and a slight smirk on his face as he stood dressed in the grey uniform of an Alliance officer.

"In the flesh," Sylar replied, spreading his arms as he grinned at her before he lowered one hand as though presenting someone to his right. "And may I present my new partner in this endeavour; everyone here calls him 'Subject Alpha'- I'm Omega, of course-, but I'm pretty sure you know him by _another _name…"

For a moment, the air where Sylar had indicated shimmered, as though it had suddenly become very hot there for some reason…

Then Claire saw someone appear- evidently they had been invisible before now- in the area that Sylar had indicated, with his hair trimmed to a length that it hadn't been since he'd recovered from his Haitian-induced amnesia, his expression a cold one that she'd never seen on his face even when he was pitted against the man now standing beside him, and wearing the same style of uniform as his old enemy, and she nearly stopped breathing from shock.

_It can't be_… she thought in shock.

But she knew that it was; nothing, not even Candice Wilmer's illusions (Based on Micah and Niki's descriptions of Candice's attempts to manipulate them and what she'd seen of them after Sylar had acquired Candice's power), had ever seemed as real to her as this.

"P… Peter?" she whispered softly.

For a moment, Claire could only stare at the incredible sight of the man she had loved and lost so long ago, standing casually in front of her with his arms folded, a blank expression on his face that gave away nothing regarding how he felt about seeing her again…

Then he suddenly thrust one hand out in front of him and blasted her in the chest with a brilliant burst of electrical energy- Claire had _never _liked that Elle woman-, sending her flying backwards into the wall behind her, and Claire knew that the situation was far worse than she'd ever expected.

* * *

AN: OK, I know that _several _people guessed it before now, but here you have it; the _who _of Subjects Alpha and Omega has finally been revealed! As for the _how_ they're here- given that the last time Claire saw them she thought that both of them had been killed-… well, that's going to take a _bit _longer to come out, but it will eventually; give it another couple of chapters


	11. The Man Behind The Academy

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As soon as 'Subject Alpha' had blasted Bennet backwards with what he could only guess was some kind of electric bolt from his hand, Mal didn't hesitate; drawing his pistol, he aimed and fired three rapid shots at each of the two men…

Who each simply held up one hand, palm upwards, and… _stopped _the bullets in mid-air.

Mal blinked in shock.

"What the _hell_?" Jayne said, beating Mal to it as he looked at what had just taken place before him with an expression that Mal had only seen on the merc's face when he was threatening to space the man for trying to hand River and Simon over to the feds. "How… how'd you _do _that?"

"Telekinesis, Mr Cobb," the man that Bennet had called Sylar said, smiling briefly at the merc before his eyes returned to the bullets before him. "Now then, as for these silly things…"

"_Get down_!" Mal yelled, barely managing to grab Jayne's arm and yank him to the ground before the bullets that had so recently been fired from Mal's pistol flew back towards the two men. Zoe and River were already moving rapidly in another direction, the two of them drawing their own weapons to fire a few shots of their own at their opponents (Mal was only partly surprised when both of them managed to halt those bullets as well; clearly these two had some pretty interesting tricks up their sleeves).

"Fast, huh?" 'Sylar' said, prompting Mal to glance up grimly at his two new adversaries as they stared down at him, a slightly blank expression on Subject Alpha's face while a sadistic gleam was evident on 'Sylar's' face. "Well, that'll just make this all the more interesting…"

"Really?" Zoe stated grimly, cocking her shotgun and glaring at the man in question. "Care to say that again _without _you doing that particular little trick?"

"Please, Mrs Washburne," the man said, raising an eyebrow as he looked at her, "you really think telekinesis is my _only _trick?"

With that statement, he extended a hand forward and launched a burst of ice at the shotgun, the barrel swiftly becoming covered in frost and leaving the end covered.

"You think _that's _freaky?" Subject Alpha added, smirking slightly as he looked at Mal's first mate. "Wait until you see _this_."

If Mal hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he wouldn't have believed it; even as he watched the sight before him, 'Subject Alpha' went from being right in the centre of the room, to being blurred, and then seemingly vanishing into thin air.

"What the- why'd that gorram experiment bail out on this tussle?" Jayne asked, looking at Mal in confusion. "He was-"

"He's still here," River interjected, raising a hand as she looked over at the mercenary critically.

"Huh?" Jayne said, looking over at River in confusion.

"I hear his inner voice," River said, her expression becoming sad as she looked up at the ceiling. "He's so lost… trapped underneath what the undying psychopath and the maniac parasite want him to be for them rather than what he truly is…"

"What the _hell_?" 'Sylar' said, glaring over at River as he raised one hand in a speculative manner, clearly planning an attack but evidently wanting more information before he did anything. "How can you… _do _that?"

"I hear it with my brain," River stated, as she turned back to look at 'Sylar', a slight smirk on her face as she looked at the man who had just stopped bullets with a wave of his hand (Mal wasn't sure whether he should be proud of her courage or afraid that she was going to get hurt). "You're good, little parasite, but you're not _that _good…"

Before any of _Serenity_'s crew could say anything to that statement, River was suddenly sent flying off to one side, prompting her crewmates to spin around in shock at the sight of their best fighter being eliminated from the fight as though she'd been…

Well, the only term that Mal could come up with was 'as though she'd been her brother', even if that wasn't exactly the most polite phrase he could use; it wasn't as though Simon hadn't improved since he originally joined the crew even if he still had a long way to go before he was at the same level as some of them.

"You really need to learn to focus more, Sylar; you get distracted too easily," the man Bennet had referred to as 'Peter' said, fading back into view where River had been mere moments ago as he looked over at the other Subject, one fist outstretched in a manner that made it clear he'd been the one to send River flying off to the side like that. "Just because she has the same power as that fat guy you told me about doesn't mean-"

"'The fat guy you told me about'?" another voice repeated from behind Mal, prompting him and the rest of the crew to look around in shock at the sight before them.

Claire Bennet, the woman who had been hit by a massive burst of electricity only moments ago- the woman Mal had been _certain _had been killed; she'd had most of her skin practically incinerated and he was fairly sure she hadn't even been breathing last time he'd checked-, was standing before them, staring in outrage and- was that fear or disbelief?- at 'Subject Alpha', even as the burns on her face and the injuries visible through the tears in her clothes began to- Mal couldn't believe what he was seeing, but it was the only term that made sense- heal themselves. "Peter, his name was Matt; he was your _friend_!"

"I'm Subject Alpha," the man stated simply as he looked back at Bennet, his almost blank expression once again reminding Mal unnervingly of the simple resolve of the Operative. "I don't _have _friends."

"You're _not _Subject Alpha!" Bennet yelled back at the man before her, tears in her eyes as she looked at the man in front of her. "You're _Peter Petrelli_! You're an empathic mimic, you care more about people than any man I've ever met, you're potentially the most powerful person on the planet, you _saved my life when I was sixteen years old_-"

"ENOUGH!" the man Bennet had called 'Sylar' said, thrusting out his hands and sending Mal, Zoe and Jayne flying back before they could react. "Alpha, grab the girl and let's _go_!"

"Right," 'Peter' said simply. Even as Mal fought to get back to his feet in time, the man in question held out his hands, only for River to apparently fly through the air towards him, landing in 'Peter's' arms before he turned to look at 'Sylar'. "Shall we go?"

"Why not?" Sylar said, grinning slightly as he placed a hand on Peter's shoulder before turning to look at Bennet. "See you again soon, _Cheerleader_."

"RIVER!" Mal yelled in horror, briefly staring in disbelief at the location where the woman he loved (RESPECTED AS A VALUED MEMBER OF HIS CREW; if River was still here somehow he _definitely _didn't want her to hear that) and their two opponents had just vanished from the room. After staring at the location for a few seconds- all the time he needed to confirm for himself that River _wouldn't _be coming back; with her skills, if she couldn't get somebody to do something quickly, she couldn't get them to do it at all-, he spun around to look resolutely at Bennet; whatever was going on here, it was a safe bet that _she _knew more about it than she'd told them earlier. "_Where IS she_?!"

"_With me, Captain Reynolds_," a calm voice said from behind them.

Spinning around to look in confusion at the source of this new voice, Mal, Zoe and Jayne's confusion only increased as they found themselves looking at a communication screen at the end of the room that hadn't been there earlier; presumably the thing had been hidden behind a panel of some kind or another. The man addressing them on the screen was fairly attractive, with fair hair, a high-domed forehead, and a cold, sadistic smirk in his eyes and on his lips that Mal definitely didn't like the look of.

"_Adam_," Bennet said suddenly, loathing evident in her voice as she walked past the others to glare at the figure on the screen, her arms folded as she stared at him. "I should have _known _you'd still be around; you always were a cockroach."

"_Didn't your friend Doctor Suresh once comment that the cockroach was the pinnacle of evolution, Miss Bennet_?" the man replied, smiling in a very self-satisfied manner at the woman that made Mal want to punch the bastard's lights out if he'd been in front of him. "_I'd actually call that a compliment, personally speaking…_"

"You would; you always were a nutcase," Bennet countered, before her eyes narrowed as she glared at the man on the screen. "I'll make this simple; what have you _done _to Peter?"

"_What makes you so sure that _is _Peter, Miss Bennet_?" the man retorted, raising an eyebrow. "_The last time I looked, Peter Petrelli and Gabriel Gray have both been dead for years, we both know that; how could they come to be _here_ after so long_-?"

"Peter had access to Hiro's powers and both of them could tap into a potentially unlimited amount of radioactive energy; it wouldn't exactly be impossible to assume that the power being channelled during that final confrontation boosted Hiro's powers and caused them both to make a jump of this magnitude," Bennet countered, her arms folded. "You wouldn't clone them, Adam; you always hated the fact that Peter was more powerful than you without even _trying_, and Sylar's DNA was such a mess that it would have been practically impossible for you to acquire a decent DNA sample. They're the real deal, Adam; Sylar's certainly sadistic enough to work with you if it means he gets the chance to prove his 'superiority'. What I want to know right now is simple; _what did you do to Peter_?"

"_Simple_," Adam replied, smirking slightly at her as he sat back. "_Once we got our hands on him, I just made him a little more… docile_."

Mal felt like being sick after that last comment.

He'd never fully understood the technical aspects of what the Alliance had done to River, but he'd gathered enough to know that they'd hacked into her brain and tried to tweak what they didn't like to make her more compliant.

If they'd done that to the guy who'd just attacked Bennet… just to make him their obedient little soldier…

From what he'd seen of her interaction with the guy in question so far, Mal had little doubt that Bennet was going to be _seriously _hacked-off about what they'd done.

"You couldn't have done it," Bennet countered, glaring at the screen before them as though the rest of the people in the room didn't even exist. "Peter can do what we can do; his brain would have automatically healed from anything you did to him…"

Then her eyes widened in shock as the implications apparently struck her. "Unless you'd _blocked _that power…"

"'_Blocked' is such an ugly word, Miss Bennet; I prefer to think that we… temporarily deprived him access to that ability_," 'Adam' said, looking at her in a satisfied manner as he spoke. "_It's still there, of course, but my scientists and I were able to isolate the part of his brain that allows him to access that part of his 'rolodex' and use it and… restrict his access to it, shall we say? It's a catch-22 situation, if you will; he can't access that power again unless he heals the damage that's been done to his brain, and he can't heal the damage unless he has access to that power- and don't think you've brought him back by making contact with him; the damage was so great you'd need to be directly beside him before his body could duplicate your power exactly enough to bring him back_."

Much to Mal's surprise, Bennet suddenly smiled.

"Thank you," she said simply, as she stared at the screen in front of her. "Now I know what I have to do to get him back."

The man blinked.

"_Excuse me_?" he said, looking at Bennet as though she'd casually told him that there was a world out there where the sky was green. "_Miss Bennet, I don't believe you understand your situation; Sylar and Mr Petrelli are currently being prepared for their next mission inside one of the most secure facilities in my Company, and it is only a matter of time before Miss Tam is ready to join them_-"

"Hold on a minute; you've got guys who can stop bullets with a wave of their hands, turn invisible, and throw ice at stuff, and you want _moonbrain _on your team?" Jayne interjected, looking at the man on the screen in surprise. "What's so gorram special about _her_?"

"_She was conditioned for several months with the best combat-training protocols available to the entire Alliance, Mr Cobb; trust me, she may lack the sheer range of power accessible to her colleagues, but she is nevertheless a _very _valuable asset to the team_," the man replied, briefly smiling at Jayne as though he was surprised the mercenary hadn't realised it earlier before he turned his attention back to Bennet. "_My point, Miss Bennet, is simple; I have the resources of the Company behind me, and all you have_-"

"Is the most advanced piece of technology ever developed, the group who sent the Miranda Wave, and around five hundred years of experience," Bennet counted, her eyes narrowed as she glared at the man before her. "I'll make it simple for you, Adam; hand over Peter and River, or I _will _kill you."

"_You haven't managed to do so for five hundred years, Miss Bennet; why would that change now_?" the man retorted.

_Five hundred _years_?_ Mal thought, looking in shock between Bennet and the man on the screen in front of him as both of them casually talked about centuries without any apparent sarcasm behind their words. _What the hell's goin' _on _here_?"

"Simple," Bennet replied, her eyes narrowing as she walked forward so that she was standing in front of the screen. "You've abducted the man I love; you just made it _personal _again."

Before the man on the screen could say anything in response, Bennet drew back one hand and punched straight through the screen in front of her, sending up a shower of sparks and shattered glass. For a moment, as she turned back to look at Mal, Zoe and Jayne, Bennet's face was covered by burns and scars from the explosion and the glass, but, even as Mal watched, these scars rapidly faded, leaving only smooth skin as the young woman smiled at them.

"I know that you all have a lot of questions," she said, raising her hands reassuring as she looked at the group before her, "and believe me, I _will _answer them for you, but right now, we _have _to get out of here if we want to get River and Peter back; right now, you _need _my help if you're going to stand any chance of holding your own against someone like Adam or Sylar."

For a moment, Mal simply stared silently at the woman before him, his eyes narrowed as he attempted to determine whether or not she was being honest with him or if she was keeping something else back…

No sooner had that thought crossed his mind, however, than he stopped it; when he thought about it, she actually _hadn't _kept anything back, she'd just not mentioned it. So what if she was (Assuming that she and this 'Adam' berk were to be believed) over five hundred years old; nobody had actually _asked _her how old she was or if she was one of those 'evolved humans' she'd mentioned (Baring some kind of android, he couldn't think of any other explanation for how she could be _that _old), so it wasn't like she'd lied to them when they'd asked her a direct question or something like that.

As far as he knew, she'd omitted some things, but she hadn't actually _lied _to him or his crew about anything; that put her one up over some of the people he had to deal with on a daily basis, as far as he was concerned.

"Right then," he said grimly, his arms folded as he looked resolutely at her. "Think you can track 'em to wherever they took River?"

"Now that I know that Peter's with them?" Bennet replied, allowing herself a slight smile as she spoke. "It's a piece of cake."

"Right then," Mal said, nodding slightly back at her. "In that case, we get back to _Serenity_, get out of this piece of _go su_, and, while we're on our way to wherever they are now, _you _are goin' to fill us in on what you _didn't _tell us 'bout yourself; what I'm seein' suggests there's a lot of that we need to know now, correct?"

"Correct," Bennet replied, a briefly apologetic look on her face before she turned around to indicate the door behind them. "Anyway, let's go; I, for one, am _not _interested in spending any longer around here than I have to."

Even as they began to run back to _Serenity_, however, a part of Mal was already wondering if it would be in time to save River and this 'Peter' guy Bennet was so concerned about…


	12. The True Story of Claire Bennet

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As he sat in _Serenity_'s hanger bay impatiently waiting for his sister and the rest of his… friends? Family? One term was inadequate and the other term just didn't quite _fit _in his opinion… to return to the ship, Simon was once again reminded of why he had started taking combat lessons from Jayne after the Miranda Wave had been broadcast; he hated the waiting.

It was almost funny, really; he could conduct the most time-consuming operations ever conceived without even the slightest whisper of complaint, but put him in a position where he had to wait for his sister to come back from fighting through a mass of villains whom she could almost certainly take apart with her bare hands after all the combat conditioning she'd undergone while at the Academy and he could barely wait more than a couple of minutes at a time without starting to worry about her.

He knew that it was stupid, of course, but he couldn't help it; he'd been trying to get training because he wanted to feel like he was able to do more than just _stop _people from getting hurt while he was on _Serenity_, even if it meant he'd be hurting other people instead.

So far, however, that hope hadn't worked out; after the initial wave of soldiers had been dealt with, _Serenity_'s position at the docking bay had been almost ridiculously easy to maintain. Nobody even seemed to be that concerned about their continued presence on the ship; it was as though the crew had either already taken care of all the guards that the facility had to offer or the guards had simply preferred to focus on other matters than the ship that had forcibly docked with them.

Just as he was about to turn and try and start up another conversation with Kaylee about something- maybe he'd ask if she had any particular favourite novel or something like that when she was growing up; it was almost ridiculous how little they really knew about each other's personal lives pre-_Serenity_-, the hurried sound of footsteps broke the silence, prompting the three remaining crewmembers to point their weapons at the entrance just before Mal, Zoe, Jayne and Bennet came charging around the corridor. Simon's stunned eyes briefly registered that Bennet's clothing seemed to have been badly burned while leaving her own skin and flesh virtually unscathed- how the hell could _that _have happened?- but then his brain process who _wasn't _present in front of him right now, and his mind instantly went into a state of panic.

"What the- where's River?" he asked, looking at Mal in a combination of anxiety, fear, and barely restrained anger; only the fact that the fear was dominant right now prevented him from punching Mal like he had after that near-disastrous attempt to rob that Alliance vault that culminated in a Reaver attack. "What happened to-?"

"Short version?" Bennet interjected, glaring at Simon as she stepped in front of Mal, still declining to explain her damaged clothes (Some of the holes were still _smoking_, for crying out loud!). "She was abducted by a brain-stealing psychopath- who's almost certainly been promised access to some very interesting powers in exchange for his loyalty-, and the most powerful man who ever lived- who's been partly lobotomised to prevent him from breaking his conditioning-, and if we don't get moving right _now_, there's every possibility that they'll soon be so far away that we'll _never _be able to catch up with them. Understand?"

Simon blinked incredulously.

"Excuse me?" Inara said, looking in confusion at Bennet as she walked forward to look at the other woman in confusion. "What do you mean, River's been abducted; no other ship has left-"

"These suckers don't _need_ ships, apparently; explain when we're on our way," Mal said briefly, as he glanced over at where Kaylee was standing beside the door controls. "Get that thing shut as soon as possible; I'll get the ship out of here and join you all in the galley as soon as I can."

With that said, he looked critically over at Bennet, his arms folded as he stared at her. "That OK with you?"

"Fine," Bennet replied, indicating her damaged coat as she looked back at the captain with a slight smile. "I need to change anyway; that gives me a few minutes to do it."

"What-?" Inara asked, looking at Bennet's damaged clothing as though she'd only just realised there was a problem with it; Simon would have liked to assume that she'd just been too focused on the more obvious problem of River being missing to focus on those issues, but had to admit that part of the issue might have been that she simply didn't register the new arrival's presence due to her own preoccupation with Mal. "What _happened _to you?"

"Put it simply?" Bennet replied, a slight smirk on her face as she looked over at Inara. "I got hit by several thousand volts of electricity, Miss Serra; that kind of thing tends to ruin the clothes."

Before any of _Serenity_'s crew could respond to that, Bennet had walked off towards the ship's passenger quarters, shrugging off her coat even as she drew her sword to examine it. For a brief moment Simon noted that it seemed to be in good shape despite the electric assault that Bennet had been exposed to, then he kicked himself as he remembered that such a thing _couldn't _happen; Bennet had to be making that part of the story up…

Didn't she?

Then he recalled what she'd told him about the evolutionary leap that humanity had made centuries ago, only for it to be kept secret from them even up to this point, and instantly re-evaluated his assessment of her story; if it was possible for River's abilities to be at least partly natural, it was hardly that much of a stretch to assume that Bennet _might _be telling the truth…

* * *

A few minutes later, Claire stood in _Serenity_'s main galley, now dressed in her old Independence War brown coat- she always kept a couple of spares in the event that she went into a fight with people who might have the ability to damage the original coat too badly; that leather wasn't that easy to repair following the War, so she liked to keep it in good condition- over the white shirt and black trousers that always reminded her of Peter- they'd had to be repaired a lot over the years, of course, but this was the outfit she'd worn most often whenever she and Peter had fought side-by-side, so she preferred to keep them in good condition-, Hiro's old sword hanging by her side as she looked out at the critical expressions of the crew as they sat before her.

"Right then," she said, clasping her hands together as she looked out at the group before her. "I suppose that you all want to know what happened on the station?"

"That _would _be a good place to start," Jayne said, looking grimly at the blond woman before him. "For one thing, how the gorram _hell _did you appear to _know _those 'Subjects Alpha' and 'Omega'?"

"Well, that answer requires me to go back at _bit _further than you'd expect," Claire said, briefly looking awkwardly at her new allies- after what had just happened, she had the feeling that it would take a _long _time before they would consider her a 'friend'- before she continued. "You remember what I told you about humanity undergoing an evolutionary leap at the beginning of the twenty-first century; you know, people learning they can turn invisible, read minds, things like that?"

"Yeah…" Kaylee said, looking in confusion at the crew's new ally. "What about it?"

"What I didn't tell you about that evolutionary leap…" Claire began, taking a deep breath to prepare herself for what she was about to admit before she continued to talk, "… was that I was _there _when it happened."

For a moment, there was silence all around the table, until, finally, Zoe broke the silence.

"Hold on; you really expect us to believe that you're old enough to have been around _that _long?" she asked, raising a critical eyebrow as she looked at the young woman before her. "You can't be more than thirty-"

"My ability to age was significantly retarded after my powers kicked in," Claire interjected, looking resolutely over at Zoe. "Trust me, Corporal Washburne; I may not look it, but I _am _over six hundred years old."

"How…?" Simon began, looking at Claire with eyes that were so wide the one-time cheerleader briefly wondered how he managed to keep them inside his head.

"My power is the ability of spontaneous regeneration, Doctor Tam," she said by way of explanation as she turned to look at the young man in question. "Whenever I'm injured in any way, shape or form- dislocated arm, stab-wound in the chest, electric shock, fall from a great height, broken neck; you name it, at one time or another I've probably been killed by it or at least been injured by it-, my body automatically heals itself, bringing me back to life with no trace of the injury. It's happened so much over the years that my body now exists in a near-continuous state of regeneration, my cells dying and regenerating at such a rapid rate that the aging process is practically suspended; best estimate is that I age about one year every fifty, so I'm physically in my approximate mid-twenties."

"Really?" Jayne said, looking at her with a slightly sceptical expression. "No offence, but how do we know you ain't lyin'?"

"Mr Cobb," Claire said, rolling her eyes as she turned to look at the mercenary, "you saw me regrow at least forty per cent of my skin and muscle after Peter hit me with an electric blast, and my clothes still have holes in them from where my skin caught on fire before the injuries healed; do you _really _think that I'm capable of faking something that looks _that _realistic, particularly after what you saw the two of them accomplish on their own?"

After a moment's silence- during which Claire noted that Jayne appeared to be lost in thought, or at least as lost in thought as he could get-, Mal broke the silence as he leaned forward and smiled slightly at Jayne.

"Gotta admit, she makes a good argument," he said simply, before his eyes narrowed as he turned to look at Claire. "Now then, care to fill us in on who those two guys were back there?"

"Put simply, the two most powerful men who ever lived," Claire replied, her expression grim as she looked at the crew. "Back when my power first manifested, there was a serial killer active who went by the name of Sylar; his real name was Gabriel Gray, and he was a watchmaker who possessed the power of intuitive aptitude-"

"The power of what?" Jayne cut in, looking in confusion at the blonde woman before them.

"He had an intuitive knack for knowing how things work; just by looking at things, he knew how they worked and how to fix any problems that there might be with them," Claire explained. "Obviously, at the time that wasn't that useful an ability, but when he met a man with telekinesis- the ability to move things with his mind- who saw his ability as a problem, he was able to use his power to work out how to take away what the man perceived as a 'problem'."

"Hold on a minute…" Mal said, his eyes widening as he reflected on what she had told them earlier. "Are you sayin'… this guy ate _brains _to get these… powers… from their original owners?"

"So… he's possibly where they might've got the idea about how to give River her 'extras'?" Zoe continued, catching on to her captain's train of thought.

"More than likely; he made quite an impression among those who knew about him, which included the Company that would go on to become the Academy where River received her 'extras'," Claire replied briefly, before she continued her story. "Anyway, for a time Gray- calling himself 'Sylar' after a watch he was wearing when he was looking for an idea for an alias when he met his first victim- began a prolonged murder spree to acquire the abilities of others, using the research of Doctor Chandra Suresh, a geneticist who'd learned about people manifesting abilities after his daughter Shanti's power resulted in her contracting a rare but fatal virus- don't worry, all traces of it were wiped out when Earth-That-Was was lost- to identify potential metahumans. By the time he came after me- at the time my power had only recently manifested; I was a sixteen-year-old cheerleader from Odessa, a town in Texas-, he'd already acquired telekinesis, the ability to generate ice, and a perfect memory at least, and was interested in acquiring my ability to heal myself; with something like that, he would have become practically unstoppable."

"So… how'd you beat 'im?" Kaylee asked, looking inquiringly at the woman at the head of the table.

"I was saved by Peter," Claire replied. Noting Mal's incredulous expression, she held up a hand to stop him. "I _know _that surprises you, but I assure you, the Peter we saw in the station has been brainwashed; that is _not _the man he is."

"Uh… right," Mal said, nodding in dazed understanding as he looked at Claire before he spoke again. "So… what's Peter do?"

"His power is the power of empathic mimicry; basically, once he encounters anyone with another superhuman power, he can mimic it whenever he's in their presence, and, after he's out of range, he can tap into their power again simply by recalling how they made him feel," Claire explained, a slight smile on her face at the memory of those old days when she, Peter and their friends had fought to save the world on a regular basis. "When he came to save me from Sylar, he'd been contacted by a future version of a man we'd meet in the future; Hiro Nakamura, the Class Five I mentioned earlier who could travel in time and space. As we later gathered, he'd come from a future where Sylar had succeeded in acquiring my power and, as a result, about a month after he'd killed me, Hiro's attempt to kill Sylar before he could destroy New York City by releasing a powerful nuclear explosion failed because Sylar was able to heal from Hiro's attempt to stab him. As a result, an alternate future had been created where people with powers were hunted as terrorists and criminals regardless of whether they'd actually done anything wrong, driving Hiro to travel back in time and make contact with Peter, telling him to- and I quote- 'Save the cheerleader; save the world'."

"Ah," Mal said; to his credit, Claire could tell that he wasn't entirely certain he understood the temporal mechanics involved in her last statement, but he was willing to put it aside in favour of the more central issue. "And… in this _new _timeline?"

"Peter bought me enough time to get away from Sylar by dragging him off the side of the school amphitheatre, his body subsequently mimicking my ability to heal to recover from the damage that had been done," Claire explained. "Sylar got away that time, but he didn't acquire _my _power; as a result, when he, Peter and Hiro faced off in New York a couple of weeks later, Sylar was prevented from exploding by Hiro stabbing him in the chest with his sword-"

"Hold on a minute; his _sword_?" Inara asked, raising a hand as she looked at Claire with wide eyes. "Would that be…?"

"_This _sword?" Claire asked, smiling slightly as she drew the sword and held it out before her. "Yep, this is it; over nine hundred years old and still as sharp as ever. Hiro gave it to me the night before he died; he told me to use it the way it should be used, and I like to think I've lived up to that promise."

"Incredible…" Simon breathed, staring at the sword with wide eyes before he shook his head and forced his mind back onto the topic at hand. "Hold on a minute; the history lesson's fascinating, but what do these people have to do with River's disappearance?"

"These Peter and Sylar suckers are the ones who abducted her," Mal said bluntly as he looked at Claire. "Which means, now that you've cleared up the questions of who they are and how they can do all that, what I _really _want to know now is simple; how'd they get here?"

"I'm getting to that," Claire said, shaking her head with a slight smile as she looked at Mal. "After the battle in New York, our group- Peter and I had encountered a bunch of other people with powers during our attempts to stop Sylar, and we kind of ended up working together- went their separate ways for a while- particularly since Peter was presumed dead when he nearly exploded because he couldn't control the power of this guy who could generate radiation-, but we later came back together as a group after this guy Adam Monroe attempted to release the Shanti virus upon the world-"

"Hold on a minute; when you say 'Adam Monroe', would he… be the Adam you just spoke to in there?" Zoe interrupted, looking pointedly at Claire as she jerked a hand back in the direction that the satellite headquarters had been. "He was around back then as _well_?"

"Yes, he was, and before you ask how he got here, he's like me; his ability allowed him to essentially _live _his way to the present due to his cells dying and regenerating at such a rapid rate that his ability to age no longer even exists," Claire said, looking over at the widow. "He's a few centuries older than me, of course- as far as anyone can tell he was one of the first people to develop an ability; his ability to heal was activated in 1671 and just went into overdrive to save his life after he was caught in an explosion-, but he can't do anything that I can't do; we were pretty much evenly matched the last time we thought, even if he _did _cut off my arm…"

"He cut off your _arm_?" Inara repeated incredulously, looking in shock at Claire's two clearly natural arms. "And you… what, grew another one?"

"I'm a bit like a lizard that way, Miss Serra; I can regrow most of my limbs," Claire said simply, before she turned to glare at Jayne. "And before you ask, Mr Cobb, as far as I know that does _not _include my head; I've never been inclined to find that out and I'm pretty sure it wouldn't work anyway."

"Uh… right," Jayne said, nodding briefly in understanding.

"_Gettin' back on topic here_," Mal cut in, glaring over at the rest of his crew before his attention focused back on Claire once more, "you're saying this 'Adam' guy has your power?"

"Yep," Claire replied with a brief nod.

"And, from what you said, you think that these guys we're dealing with are the _original _people you knew, not… _clones_ or something like that?" Mal asked, trying to conceal his distaste of the word 'clones'; even if some people were rumoured to have mastered the technique for use in organ transplants or stuff like that, he still didn't like to think much about the concept.

"Again, yes," Claire said as she nodded once again.

"So," the former Independent war hero said, leaning forward to glare at Claire in a manner that made it clear he wanted them to stick to the topic at hand this time around, "care to explain how two guys who were around on Earth-That-Was five hundred years ago can still be hangin' around here?"

"Well, I don't actually _know_, but it's not that hard to figure out," Claire explained, a grim expression on her face as she looked around the table. "As I said, some time after the New York confrontation our group came back together following our attempt to prevent Adam releasing the Shanti virus, followed by us opposing such varied problems as rogue superhumans or some of the Company's other plans to bring all superhumans under their control, but it eventually culminated in Sylar's attempts to return to New York as he tried to trigger the city's destruction all over again."

"Why did he want to destroy the city anyway?" Simon asked.

Claire shrugged.

"We could never really understand how his mind worked; our best guess was that he was seeking to prove how powerful he was by demonstrating the power he could wield against his 'inferiors'," she said, shrugging dismissively; it had been a long time ago and she'd long given up any attempts to understand what Sylar had been thinking all those years ago. "Anyway, we managed to track him to where he was intending to set the explosion off, but in the final confrontation, as it came down to just him and Peter, Peter was forced to tap into his own nuclear power- I think he said something about trying to _drain _Sylar's power to stop him getting the energy together to destroy New York-, but then there was this whole thing when both of them seemed to go off at once- not even our telepath could tell what had happened; something about the energy they were generating pushing their brainwaves to a higher level as the neural activity in their brains was altered prevented him from reading their minds; the specifics elude me at the moment-, and when the explosion had faded, both Peter and Sylar had vanished."

"And you think… what? They _teleported _here using the powers of that… 'Hiro' person you mentioned earlier?" Simon asked, looking sceptically at her. "I'm sorry, but I don't care _how _powerful they were; there's no way two people can teleport-"

"Only one; Sylar didn't have Hiro's power," Claire interjected, looking at Simon with a slight smile. "Get your facts straight if you're going to criticise me, Doctor Tam; too many people back then ignored Doctor Suresh's findings just because they didn't agree with them rather than because they'd found contradicting evidence."

"All right, fine, just _one _person, but I still don't buy it; how could one man teleport himself and another person across five hundred years of time and who knows how many millions of miles in space?" Simon countered, looking critically at Claire.

"At the time they vanished, Peter and Sylar were both channelling enough power to destroy the whole of New York City; I think it's safe to say that controlling that much power would have given their abilities a _significant _boost," Claire said by way of explanation, looking back at the young genius before her to make sure that he understood what she was telling him. "Exactly how they ended up _here _I don't know, but given that I have no real idea when the Academy acquired Peter and Sylar it's possible that Peter was subconsciously 'aiming' for me and arrived on a planet where I was at the time but just landed in the wrong place; I really can't say-"

"And why would he be 'aiming' for you?" Inara put in, looking critically at the young woman before her.

Claire simply smiled.

"We were… very close… back in the old days," she said by way of explanation, allowing herself a brief moment to remember all the good moments of her and Peter's relationship- omitting the fact that they'd never been bale to have the relationship she'd _wanted _to have with him, naturally- before she turned back to look at them. "The point is, now that I know who we're dealing with, I have a means of tracking where they are."

"Which is?" Mal asked.

"This," Claire replied, reaching into her pocket and pulling out the Device.

"That dohickey?" Jayne asked, raising a confused eyebrow as he looked at the Device. "What's it gonna do to help us?"

"This 'dohickey', Mr Cobb, was created by the greatest technological genius who has ever lived," Claire retorted, glaring briefly at the mercenary before looking around at the others. "Micah Sanders; his father could walk through walls and his mother possessed superhuman strength- she had some mental issues, but she got through them well enough-, but Micah himself possessed the ability to do _anything _with technology just by touching it. Not only was he able to rig an entire election by simply coming into contact with one voting computer, but, on a more minor scale, he could even give us free cable wherever we went-"

"I thought you said your group were _heroes_?" Kaylee interjected, looking almost critically at the other woman.

"Micah was tricked into doing the election thing; he wouldn't have done it if he'd really known what the people were planning," Claire countered. "And as for the cable thing… well, I never said we were _perfect_, but we only did that when we felt it necessary to keep track of something via the news when we were strapped for cash and staying in hotels."

(Admittedly, that last comment was a little white lie- they had occasionally been known to use Micah's powers to watch free movies when they'd wanted to, among other things- but they'd always taken care to never hurt anyone else when using their powers, and any changes they'd made to the contents of hotel rooms had always been 'reset' before they left, so in the end nobody had been hurt)

"_Anyway_," she continued, shooting the group a brief glare before she began to speak once again, "the point is, when Micah created this for me, he also created it with the ability to track… certain people… in case I ever wanted to find them. Peter is one of the people this thing was designed to track, so theoretically, if I can plug it into _Serenity_'s own sensors, we should be able to find wherever Peter went, and then track down him, River and Sylar in a matter of minutes."

(All of which was true, of course; so long as she didn't mention that it had been designed to help Claire keep track of her relatives on Nathan's side of the family, nobody had to _know _that Peter was her uncle and could just assume that the Device was tracking him based on his power level or something like that…)

"Uh… you _are _aware that _Serenity_'s sensors aren't able to scan much more than down to a planet, right?" Mal pointed out, looking uncertainly at the woman before him. "Not rightly sure we can find a man who can travel to other _planets_…"

"As I said, he was channelling an enormous amount of power when he made that jump; I'm confident that he can't repeat it again," Claire replied simply, before she held up a hand to stop Kaylee. "And to answer your question, Miss Frye, Micah created the Device to be automatically upgradeable and constantly compatible with any form of technology that developed in the future; no matter what changes about the world I live in, this machine will always be able to be used in conjunction with every other form of technology in existence at the time. As I've already demonstrated, it can still hack into any kind of computer system you care to select; it would almost certainly be child's play to connect it to _Serenity _and have the ship search for Peter."

With that said, Claire turned to look at Mal, an earnest expression on her face. "So, how about it, Captain? Shall I plug this thing in and find our missing Subjects, or what?"

* * *

For a moment, Mal simply sat and stared at the seemingly young woman before him, his mind in a whirl over what she had just told him.

She was over five hundred years old.

She had lived on Earth-That-Was.

She literally _couldn't _be killed unless someone cut off her head; she could even regrow _limbs _if they were lost for some reason or another.

An old friend of hers- most likely more than a friend; the way she'd talked about him reminded him more than a bit of the way Kaylee and Zoe had talked about Simon and Wash- had literally _time travelled _all the way from Earth-That-Was in the past to somewhere around here in the present, and possessed the abilities of anyone he'd met with abilities.

He'd apparently been brainwashed by _another _immortal bugger from back there- this one a total basket case who, based on what they'd seen and heard about the guy so far, would probably make some of the people Mal had met in his line of work look cuddly by comparison-, and was now working with a total psycho who'd been prepared to blow up a city just to prove that he was 'better' than everyone else.

They'd captured River and taken her back to the Academy that had nearly destroyed her to turn her into a weapon once again.

They might only have a limited amount of time to get to her before the programming became so deep she was royally screwed…

That, more than anything, made up Mal's mind.

"Plug it in," he said resolutely, standing up and looking around at the crew. "Everyone get ready; we're goin' in hot this time 'round."


	13. Awkward Conversations

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

"So," Mal said a few minutes later, as he and Bennet sat alone in _Serenity_'s cockpit, hading for the location indicated on the Device while the rest of the crew prepared for the upcoming confrontation- as Claire had assumed, the Device had tracked Peter, and hence presumably Sylar and River, to the surface of the planet before them; Peter's powers still hadn't advanced enough to allow him to travel between different _planets_-, "care to explain a bit more 'bout how that thing's doin' this?"

"What, the Device?" Claire asked, looking over at the captain in surprise before shrugging dismissively. "What's to tell; it was a final gift created by a friend of mine with an incredible knack for machinery-"

"I _meant_, care to explain more about how it's meant to be able to track this 'Peter' guy in particular?" Mal asked, looking pointedly at Claire as he set _Serenity _on autopilot; it was all straight flying for the next few moments anyway, so he felt comfortable enough just leaving the ship to do its own thing. "You said that it had been built to help you keep track of 'certain people', but given that you didn't use it to look for 'em when we thought they were just high-level superhumans, pretty sure power level ain't it; just havin' trouble working out what _else _it could be."

Claire opened her mouth to say something, but Mal cut her off by quickly raising his right index finger. "And don't say it's to help you find your old teammates; don't know when this Micah guy made you that thing, but something that nifty seems more like 'parting gift' than 'casual present'. Call me crazy, but I got a feelin' he died shortly after he made that thing for you, and if he was the _kid _of two people you knew he was probably one of the last of your 'group' left, so why would he make somethin' to find people you thought had snuffed it?"

For a moment Claire simply stared silently out at the sight before her, the nearby planet growing ever more prominent in the forward windows as _Serenity _drew closer to their intended target, before she sighed and glanced back at Mal.

"You're not as dumb as you act, are you?" she asked, smiling slightly at her new ally to take any potential sting out of her statement.

"Wouldn't have survived the war if I was," Mal replied casually, even as he continued to glare pointedly at the immortal woman. "So, how's this thing let you track Peter?"

After a brief silence, during which Mal stared at Claire while Claire look at the sight before them, Claire spoke again.

"When I first met him, he had fallen off a rooftop to save my life despite the fact that he didn't know who I was and had no way of knowing that my power would save his life," she began; Mal didn't bother interrupting, knowing that she would probably get to the point of her 'speech' in her own time. "Later on, when I spoke to him in a police cell when he was taken in for questioning- he _was _covered in his own blood without there being even a scratch on him only a short distance away from where a cheerleader had been forcibly separated from the top of her head; that's not exactly the kind of thing that's easy to explain-, he told me that he'd had to save me to save the world, answering every question I had for him without any hesitation. For the next two weeks, when I learned that my adopted father belonged to a Company that hunted down people with abilities like they were automatically dangerous without any thought of who they were as _people_- I'd been given to him as a baby with instructions that I be handed over to his bosses if I manifested any powers-, I was forced to act like I'd had my memory erased and didn't even know that Peter existed, and then, after I met my biological mother- Meredith Gordon; she could generate fire- and learned that my biological father had paid her off to be quiet about me while he ran for congress, my house was attacked by a guy who could generate radiation. With my abilities exposed after I was forced to go into the house when the guy was running the risk of exploding- long story; I'll tell you more about that later-, I ran all the way to New York in the hope that Peter could help me, and…"

She paused for a moment, trying to collect herself as she prepared to say the words that she knew would change the way her new ally looked at her, before she finished speaking. "I learned that his brother was my biological father."

Mal blinked.

"You're right, Captain Reynolds; it _isn't _tracking Peter based on power level," Claire explained, looking silently out of the window before her. "The Device is able to track Peter because it was programmed by Micah to help me keep track of my father's family after I lost touch with them; I never had any children of my own."

After another moment of stunned silence, _Serenity_'s captain finally managed to break through the shock that had stunned his brain into silence.

"Hold on; this 'Peter' guy's your _uncle_?" he said, looking at her in surprise. "But-"

"I _know _I talk about him like he wasn't… isn't… whatever tense you want me to use in this situation; it's because I never _thought _of him as my uncle," Claire explained, looking increasingly uncomfortable in her seat as she tried to look anywhere but at Mal. "When I first met him, he was just the hot older guy looking in the trophy cabinet, then he was the hot older guy who was apparently trying to save me, and then I spent over two weeks thinking of him as the hot older guy who was prepared to _die _to save someone he'd never even met when he thought that it would be the last thing he ever did."

"Huh?" Mal asked, looking at her in confusion.

"You remember how I told you that Peter came to my school to save me after receiving a warning of a version of Hiro Nakamura from an alternate future where I _hadn't _been saved?" Claire said. After Mal nodded, Claire continued. "Well, Hiro's message might have let him know that it was important to save me, but Peter only knew where to find me because of these paintings done by a man called Isaac Mendez, who had the ability to paint the future."

"Paint the future?" Mal said, looking over at his ally in surprise. "You mean… he could _paint _stuff before it happened?"

"Yeah, but it wasn't as cool as you'd think; he couldn't actually _choose _what he painted, and most of the time it just gave you one image without providing Isaac with any insight into its context or anything like that," Claire explained. "That's actually what makes what Peter did so… so _heroic_, really; Isaac had painted Peter lying on the ground in front of the entrance to my school after falling off the roof while fighting Sylar, but he _hadn't _painted Peter healing from it."

Mal blinked.

"Hold on; when you say this guy had painted Peter _after_ he fell off the roof…" he said uncertainly.

"I mean that he'd painted Peter lying on the ground with his bones horribly twisted and looking out from the painting in a manner that was definitely _not _one you'd have on your face if you were alive in that condition," Claire clarified, looking pointedly at Mal to make sure he understood what she was saying before she continued. "The point is, Peter had come all that way, _convinced _that he was going to die, with no idea why I was so important or why somebody wanted to kill me, and he'd… he'd literally _died _for me; how could I _not _love him for that?"

Mal had to admit, she had a point; Hell, if _he'd _been in her position, he'd definitely have admired the kinda guy willing to make those kinda sacrifices for someone who was just a stranger, even if he wouldn't have gone so far as to say he _loved _the guy…

"So, you fell for him _before_ you found out that he was your uncle, huh?" he said, shrugging sympathetically at her. "Must've been tough…"

"Tell me about it; I was absolutely _devastated _when I found out who he was," Claire said, a saddened expression on her face as she recalled those dark days of her life. "I just kept feeling like I must be sick or something to think of him like that, but at the same time I just couldn't do anything to get over it, even if he was being a jerk and trying to 'protect' me without asking if I _wanted _protection. After he'd nearly died when he almost accidentally blew up New York, I was devastated for several months afterwards; I even nearly ended up in a potentially destructive relationship with a guy who could fly and had _no _qualms about abusing his powers, just because he looked a bit like Peter-"

"Abusing his powers?" Mal repeated in confusion. "How could you 'abuse' the ability to fly; doesn't sound like the kind of thing you could use normally…"

"We set up an incident where the captain of my new school's cheerleading squad saw him fly me up and drop me onto the seats around the sports field; everyone thought she was just hallucinating after too much to drink and she got booted off the squad," Claire clarified, shaking her head with an evident expression of self-loathing on her face as she recalled her attitude back then. "God… I actually _listened _to him when he said I was 'better' than her by _definition _just because I had powers; that kind of attitude resulted in Sylar trying to blow up a _city_, and I _still _went along with it, just because I didn't want to be alone…"

"Uh… you _were _a kid back then; we all do stuff we're not proud of when we look back at it when we're young," Mal said, trying to sound reassuring even as he couldn't believe he was in this situation; how often did you have to reassure someone you didn't blame them for something they'd done five _centuries _ago? " 'Sides, from what you've told me, you pretty much made up for _that_ little screw-up after everything you and your group did when you got back together; you really goin' to keep beatin' yourself up for it forever?"

Despite her own grim mood, Claire chuckled (Much to Mal's relief; he really _sucked _at giving motivational speeches these days).

"Actually, by this stage it's pretty much only the Peter-related issues that I'm beating myself up over; every other mistake I made I like to think I've made up for by what I've done or tried to do since then," she replied, shaking her head wistfully at the memories before she began to tell her story again. "The point is, ever since my powers first manifested and I first learned just how _different _I was from everyone else, the one thing I've always regretted is that Peter and I never even _tried _to explore our feelings because we knew how everyone would react. We each knew _how _we felt, of course- one of the first powers Peter absorbed had been telepathy and we all took a while to learn how to stop people from reading our minds unless we wanted them to; secrets, for a while, weren't something that it was possible to keep-, but we never acted on them, trying to just get along as _friends _even if we could never be together as _lovers_…"

As Claire fell into silence, staring out of the window before her at the vast landscape of space, the planet before them growing ever more prominent as the Device led their ship towards the location where their friends and loved ones were currently held, Mal could only look thoughtfully at her for a few moments, his mind turning over the implications of the regret that was evident in her voice- evidently time hadn't done much to stop her wishing things had been different back then-, before he spoke again.

"You _sure _'bout that?" he asked.

Claire blinked.

"E-excuse me?" she said, turning to look in confusion at Mal.

"Well… you _sure _you can't be together… _that _way?" Mal continued; he looked like he found it somewhat uncomfortable even to be talking about this, but at the same time he evidently felt as though he should say what was currently on his mind. "I mean, apart from the Academy, the people on this boat are probably the only people alive right now who even know you two _know _each other, and… I'm guessin' I'm the first one you've told 'bout you an' him bein' related?"

"Well, River knows, but that was just because she read my mind when I was thinking about Peter when we were talking about… stuff…" Claire said, stopping herself from mentioning what precisely the 'stuff' was at the last minute; the last thing she wanted right now was to tell Mal about River's feelings for him before River was ready to tell him herself. "So what?"

"Well… does it really _matter _that you're related?"

Claire blinked in surprise.

Whatever she'd been expecting Mal to say and, admittedly, she had no real idea _what _she'd expected him to say- that _definitely _hadn't been it.

"I mean," Mal continued, once again looking uncomfortably ahead of himself- whether because he'd never found it easy talking about relationships or because his pre-war religious background made it hard for him to talk about incestuous relationships, Claire wasn't sure-, "that… when you get down to it… who's still around now who'd actually _care _if you and Peter got… involved… with each other? I'm not going to tell anybody, an' I think I can guarantee you that River ain't goin' to mention it either," (A traitorous part of his mind pointed out that River might not be in a position to mention anything ever again after what the Academy might be doing to her right now, but Mal shoved it aside; they _would _get her back) "so, in the end, once we get him back to normal, the only thing stoppin' you from doin' anything about it is you two…"

Once again silence dominated the cabin, neither of the ship's two pilots willing or able to look at each other after such an awkward topic had been brought up, before an increasing series of beeps from the Device broke the silence and prompted Claire to look over at the screen in question.

"We're coming up on the facility," she said, looking over at Mal as she reached out to tap a few controls on _Serenity_'s console, sending the ship into a gradual descent towards the location indicated on the Device. "Tell everyone to prepare for a bumpy ride; the Device can jam most tracking systems if it needs to, but that won't stop someone trying to blow us out of the sky if they see us coming in with their eyes."

Sensing that he wasn't going to get anything more out of her on the topic of her and Peter's relationhip, Mal stood up and headed towards the main part of the ship; with the crew all currently gathered in the kitchen as they prepared for the upcoming assault, it was easier just to tell them to get ready in person rather than make the radio call.

As he left Claire in the piloting chair, however- he was fairly sure she could be trusted with his boat, of course; after being around for almost six hundred years, it seemed like a fairly safe bet that she'd have learned how to pilot at some point-, Mal couldn't help but wonder if what he'd said had made any impression on Claire Bennett, or if he'd just potentially compromised his old principles for nothing.

After all the religious background his mother had raised him with, here he was, encouraging a woman to pursue a relationship with her own _uncle_? He wasn't sure whether he should be disgusted with himself for trying to encourage her or disturbed at the fact that he actually thought it could _work_…

On the other hand…

Well, his points were valid; nobody else could even _know _about their real relationship apart from him and River, it wasn't like they'd done anything _wrong _by falling for each other before they'd known about their relationship, and the fact that they'd waited _this _long and still felt something- well, Claire had waited this long; based on Claire's theory Peter had just bypassed six hundred years in a matter of seconds- made it pretty clear that there was definitely _something _there that was worth exploring.

Of course, kids might be an issue- assumin' they even _wanted _'em, of course; Mal himself had always been of two minds about whether he actually wanted to be a father, particularly after the war had happened and his subsequent attempts to start somethin' with Inara fell apart-, but Mal wasn't so sure it would matter that much; given Claire's ability to heal and Peter's ability to copy her power, maybe their kids wouldn't inherit any of the genetic problems that were known to happen when relatives got too jiggy with it…

Forcing such thoughts out of his mind for the moment- right now he had bigger problems than whether a couple of closely-related immortals could had kids or not-, he turnd his attention back to the matter at hand as he walked resolutely towards the dining area.

In a matter of minutes, they would be in the middle of an Alliance facility, fighting their way through who-knew-what kind of security systems, culminating in them going up against Claire's potentially nigh-omnipotent uncle, a homicidal maniac who'd eaten people's brains to get more power, a thousand-year-old whackjob with a major grudge, and…

Mal swallowed.

In many ways, assuming that the Academy were as good at the brainwashing thing as they appeared to be so far- particularly when working with a subject who'd already undergone that kind of treatment once in her past-, the fourth potential opponent was the worst; he really did _not _want to be in a position where he might have to shoot _River_…


	14. The Battle Begins

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As Claire took _Serenity _down through the planet's atmosphere, the ship's nose pointing resolutely at the location that the Device had identified as where Peter was currently located- there was no way Adam could trick the Device; even if he'd been around when Micah had given it to her, the Device's constant upgrades meant that he'd have needed to acquire technology from the _future_ if he was going to ever surpass its tracking abilities, and if he'd discovered someone with Hiro's power he'd have used it far more openly by now-, she tried not to think too much about what Captain Reynolds had just suggested to her about the possibility of her and Peter actually managing to have a real _relationship _this time around.

As he'd pointed out, it wasn't as much of an issue as it had been back in the old days; their only living relatives- descended from Nathan's sons, of course; Claire herself had never had children- were so far removed from them that they wouldn't have cared about any kind of relationship between an extremely distantly related uncle and aunt, so the opinions of their relatives didn't exactly matter any more.

As for what their friends would think…

Well, as Mal had pointed out, he and River were the only two people who currently _knew _that she was Peter's niece, and he'd said himself that he wasn't going to mention the relationship to anybody else; Claire was fairly confident that River would show equal discretion. Apart from the last few days on _Serenity_, Claire hadn't spent enough time in one place long enough to make anything more than acquaintances since the Independence War had fallen apart, and even before the war she hadn't exactly encouraged close relationships. With Blue Sun representatives to be found pretty much everywhere, it was hard to know whether she could trust someone with the truth about her powers- it was one of the reasons she'd settled down on one of the outer worlds after the Exodus had arrived-, and even there she'd tried not to become too close to people.

That was the fundamental disadvantage of being immortal, really; it hurt when you got close to people and they ended up dying while you remained alive. Even if it _was _only from natural causes, that in many ways almost made it worse; you had to put up with the fact that you still looked the same as you always had while they grew old right in front of you.

Back when she'd worked with her original 'group', Hiro had tried to make her feel better about her inability to age by bringing past versions of the others into the present after their deaths- always taking care not to mention anything about _how _they'd died, of course-, but Claire had made him stop that after Niki had passed away. Despite Hiro's intentions only being for the best, it had already been approaching the point where it had become too painful for her and Micah to see their old friends with no recollection of some of the amazing experiences they'd shared; after his mother's death, Micah had refused to allow Hiro to bring her back because he wasn't sure he'd be able to control his reaction if he saw his mother again.

But, if she _did _manage to get Peter back to normal…

She'd have at least _one _familiar face available to her to make her life easier…

It was possibly the one area where she actually sympathised even _slightly _with Adam; having to watch everyone around you die while you yourself lived on without even developing a single wrinkle to show your age would be enough to put _anyone _down after a century or two of it.

Hell, after Hiro and Micah had died, Claire had felt so alone for a time that she and Adam had actually briefly become… involved (Claire _hated _herself for those few months of weakness now)… at one point shortly before the Exodus to this galaxy had begun; with the entire _planet _pretty much falling apart around them and all of Claire's friends dead, both of them had briefly managed to call a certain 'truce' and found some… comfort… in each other.

It had barely lasted two months. The two of them might have been immortal, but that aside they had virtually nothing in common; Adam's past 'betrayal' by Hiro- he'd never been able to see it as anything but a betrayal, no matter how often Claire tried to convince him that Hiro had never intended to hurt him- had left him increasingly cynical and frustrated at the world, unable to ever see the possibilities that the world might be able to advance beyond its current state, while Claire's time with Peter, Hiro and Micah had given her an optimistic view of the world that simply failed to be compatible with Adam's more nihilistic view of civilisation. In the end, the two of them had parted ways after a particularly violent argument that had culminated in a brutal sword-fight; Claire still found herself wincing slightly when she recalled how Adam had managed to slice her left arm off before she'd impaled him through the heart. At the time she'd assumed that he'd been killed- after she'd stabbed him she'd gone on to _literally _cut out his heart while making sure that a sharp rock remained in his head, hoping that his ability to heal wouldn't be able to regrow such a vital organ after she left his body to meet whatever fate had planned for it-, but as his continued existence showed, evidently her ability to heal extended to entire organs; someone must have taken the rock out of his head after she'd left the body.

If she was going to kill Adam when she reached her destination, she was evidently going to have to do it the quick and ugly way; decapitate the bastard and then destroy the brain to make sure the head couldn't grow a new body (She strongly doubted his ability to heal extended to being able to grow a new head, given Mohinder's research suggesting that peoples' powers were related to something specifically in the brain rather than a general DNA thing).

She wouldn't make the same mistake she'd made last time of wanting to make sure the bastard felt the same kind of pain he'd caused her once she realised what she'd become; this time around, if she got the chance to decapitate the bastard, his head would be gone before he had time to realise what was happening.

He'd gone _way _too far this time…

_Nobody _used Peter like he had done and got away with it; only the fact that Angela was his mother had earned her anything _like _a 'free pass' back in the day.

When she was finished here, the bastard was going to wish he _could _die _long _before she actually got around to finishing the job.

As she drew in ever close to the site that, according to the Device, marked the location where Peter- and, presumably, Sylar and River- were currently located, she quickly turned her attention back to studying the layout of the facility before her; the Device could also emit a low-level jamming frequency that prevented any scanning equipment from detecting it, although it wouldn't prevent the ship from being seen visually if someone happened to look directly at them. The facility wasn't particularly well-defended- most likely it relied on its anonymity for security rather than any actual defences it possessed itself; Adam wouldn't want to attract too much attention to this kind of area by diverting too much money to such a remote part of the galaxy-, but the entrances were secure enough to make it particularly difficult to even gain access to the interior in the first place, to say nothing of the potential guards inside it. The scale of superpowers 'available' to the general population might have gone downhill after the mass exodus, but that didn't rule out the possibility of at least _some _people with superpowers being part of the 'security force' that would await them if they attempted to enter the facility.

All it would take was a few people with powers and _Serenity_'s crew would be facing potentially more trouble than they could handle, particularly without River; Claire may have become good at fighting over the years, but her habit of fighting alone meant that she generally operated on the principle of 'outlast the other guy', and that idea definitely _wouldn't _work when she had to fight with other people, particularly with River out of the picture and _Serenity _thus missing its best hand-to-hand combatant.

If she was going to do this, she needed to come up with a plan that Adam _wouldn't _be expecting her to use…

And, now that she thought about it, Jayne Cobb might have _just _the weapons she needed to turn the tables on that arrogant son of a bitch…

"Hello?" she asked, after reaching up to turn on the ship's radio. "Could everyone come to the cockpit, please? I have a plan for how we can get into this facility as quickly as possible, and I'd rather only have to explain it once…"

* * *

"Can I just go on record and say that this girl is loonier than Mal _and _moonbrain combined _ever _were?" Jayne asked as he stood in front of _Serenity_'s airlock, a few grenades strapped to the belt he currently held in his hands as he waited impatiently by the door. "This has to be the dumbest stunt I've ever been asked to pull since I got on this boat; I'm droppin' _grenades _on a secret government base?"

"Uh… am I hearing this correctly?" Simon asked, looking over at the mercenary in surprise; with Kaylee currently in the engine room in case of an accident and Mal having joined Claire in the cockpit for the final descent, the remaining members of _Serenity_'s crew had chosen to wait in the main hold with Jayne for lack of anywhere else to be, Zoe holding her shotgun in preparation for the fight that would soon begin while Inara had once again selected her bow for the upcoming fight. "You're _complaining _about the chance to drop grenades on people?"

"Hey, at least when I throw them in a fight I can see what I'm doin'; what makes Miss Miracle-Grow up there think we won't get those psychos on us as soon as I so much as _look _funny at this place?" Jayne countered, jerking his head in the direction of _Serenity_'s cockpit as he spoke. "You heard what she said; those guys have so many freaky powers available to 'em- super-hearin' and that mind-readin' thing among 'em-, how do we know they don't _already _know we're here and aren't just waitin' for the most humiliatin' moment to show us up?"

"If they knew we were here, that 'Subject Alpha' guy would probably have blown a hole in our hull with that electricity thing he can do; fact that we're all still here seems like a clear bet he _doesn't_ know we're here," Zoe countered, looking critically at Jayne as he stood there. "You heard what Bennett told us about what had been done to those guys; given that they apparently had to _really _cut into his head to have an effect on him, somehow doubt that Alpha guy'll be operating at the top of his mental game enough to be listenin' out for us, Omega seemed more interested in just killin' us rather than botherin' 'bout humiliatin' us first, and as for River…"

She paused for a moment, looking apologetically over at Sam in an attempt to assure him that she meant nothing overly negative by what she was about to say, before she continued to speak. "Well, they haven't had her for long, and the way she's been since Miranda who's to say some of those old trigger signals'll even work any more; could be that she's not really in any kinda position to let 'em know we're her even if she's awake enough … right?" she added, looking curiously over at Simon for clarification.

After a moment's silence, the young doctor nodded in acknowledgement of her point.

"Good point; she _does _seem a bit… well, more stable, really… since she managed to tell us something more about what had been… _done _to her there," the young doctor confirmed, looking thoughtfully at Zoe as he spoke, as though seeking any kind of agreement with his theory. "Maybe… since she's not in _quite _the same mental state she was in when she had the codes… programmed… into her, she'll be more-"

Before Simon could go any further with his theory, an alarm suddenly started to blare inside the hold, indicating that Claire and Mal had manoeuvred _Serenity _into position above the facility and were ready for those in position to carry out their part of the plan.

"Ready?" Inara asked, looking over at Jayne as she walked over to stand beside the door control.

"As I ever am," Jayne replied grimly, his expression the same one he always assumed when he didn't want to give away any indication of what he was thinking.

"'Kay then," Zoe said, her expression grim as she pressed the button to open the first door. "Don't forget, you need to keep a tight grip on to somethin' once you're out there or the wind'll blow you away before any of us can do anythin'; even if the Cap'n an' Bennett're holdin' her steady, _Serenity_'s still goin' to be dealing with some _serious _wind out there-"

"OK, I got the picture; can we _not _talk about how screwy this could get?" Jayne asked, looking pointedly at the mechanic as he walked through the first door in front of him, looking back at the others with a brief scowl before the door closed behind him. Biting back the first few 'choice words' that came to mind about his current situation- ever since that whole thing after the Ariel job Jayne had _never _liked spending more time in this part of the ship then necessary-, Jayne grabbed a tight hold of the hand-railing on the nearby wall, the grenade belt in his other hand as he fixed his gaze on the narrow line where the outer ramp was closed against the rest of the ship.

Quickly checking that his hand was correctly positioned near the pin of one of the grenades- all he needed to do was trigger one of them and the rest of them would blow up in a simultaneous blast-, he stretched one hand out towards the door, his grip on the railing tightening as he waited for the hatch to open. As soon as the hatch before him had begun to lower, Jayne seized his chance, thrusting one hand forward, simultaneously pulling the pin out of the upper grenade as he released his grip on the belt, sending the grenades flying out of the narrow gap before him. A soon as he heard the sound of the resulting explosion, he reached over to hit the control that would close the outer hatch, already turning to open the inner door as the outer one began to close.

_First part down_, he thought to himself as he re-entered the main part of the ship.

He could only hope that the grenade stunt had done what Bennett thought it would do; the last thing he wanted was to end up with homicidal super-powered basket cases on his back before he even had time to get a decent gun in his hand…

* * *

As Claire studied the facility where Peter, Sylar and River were currently 'waiting' for them, she narrowed her eyes grimly as she held _Serenity _in position over the outer part of the facility, all power restricted to the bare necessities to help limit the energy they were currently releasing; the Device could protect them from sensors, but the base could still pick up the energy being generated by their engines if nothing else.

Fortunately, the crew had at least some knowledge of how the facility before them operated, which at least allowed her to pick the area where the sensors were least effective in order to launch her current 'attack'. According to Mal the facility resembled the old headquarters of a deceased 'colleague'- he hadn't exactly been a friend, but he'd helped the crew out now and again with some useful information when they'd needed it- of _Serenity_'s crew who'd called himself 'Mr Universe'. Apparently 'Mr Universe's's version of the facility had possessed multiple radio communication dishes and towers scattered around the outskirts, as well as a large central tower in the middle of the complex, but that aside it was apparently almost identical; a relatively featureless grey building, located on a narrow rocky cliff just barely wide enough to support the building, while being simultaneously too unstable to allow any ships that might wish to attack the facility to land anywhere other than the designated landing area. Bombing the facility would still destroy it, of course, but Claire had a theory that anyone who knew enough to know that this base was here would also know have a distinct lack of interest in bombing the place; how could they collect any of information that Adam might have collected about the 'specials' that remained in this time if they blew the place up?

It was almost too bad that they had to save Peter and River from this place; even with the notable disadvantage of _Serenity _not actually having any weapons, with the kind of firepower Jayne had available to him Claire had little doubt that they could probably have trashed this damn place fairly quickly with the Device shielding them from the sensors. As it was, however, they needed the facility intact if they were going to guarantee Peter and River's safety and Adam and Sylar's deaths, forcing Claire to partially improvise a plan of attack and hope for the best.

All in all, however, despite the limited time she'd had to come up with a plan- once they'd been able to get a relatively clear picture of the facility based on _Serenity_'s scanners the crew had provided her with the information they'd taken from Mr Universe's old databanks-, Claire was generally satisfied with their current strategy. The grenades that Jayne had just dropped had landed almost directly on the roof of the building, creating a significantly-sized hole that simultaneously- assuming that the plans for this facility didn't differ too much from the plans for the one the crew knew- took out the main power generator for most of the facility's internal defences and communication systems. With those down for the count, the few people in the facility would find it particularly difficult to coordinate an effective attack against the intruders, made even harder by the fact that the automated defences they'd most likely come to rely on to help them in the event of something like this happening.

Admittedly, Sylar was still going to be a particularly problematic threat, to say nothing of what Peter and River could be capable of if Claire didn't mange to get close enough to Peter to heal him and they'd managed to 'reprogram' River enough to do what _they _wanted her to do rather than what _she _wanted to do…

Claire shook such thoughts out of her head; worrying about what _could _go wrong would accomplish nothing right now apart from leaving her paranoid and limiting her ability to contribute something useful when the time came.

They'd launched the first part of their latest attack; all that she could do was press their current line of assault and hope that things worked out at least reasonably in their favour.

She'd failed to save Peter once; she would _not _fail to save him again.

With that silent promise, Claire turned _Serenity _around and moved the ship in to land at a point a short distance away from the now-damaged base, near the edge of the small 'runway' located at one end; at this proximity it should be simple enough for the crew to reach the facility without risking being attacked, while simultaneously being far enough from the only valid entrance that whoever stayed behind could easily take out anyone attempting to take control of _Serenity_ from them.

In her long life, Claire had soon learned that there was a very obvious disadvantage to making secret facilities hard to get into; it also seriously limited your options when you wanted to get _out_ of those places, such as when you were under attack.

"Right then," Mal said, glancing briefly over at Claire as he stood up, "I'll make sure everyone else's ready; you set us down and join us when you're on the ground, 'kay?"

"Check," Claire said, nodding briefly at Mal's words as she continued to steer _Serenity _down towards the landing area just outside the facility, her eyes narrowed as she prepared for what was about to come.

It had been a long time since she had last faced an opponent capable of giving her an actual challenge; in a strange way, she was actually looking forward to facing Sylar again almost as much as she wanted to be reunited with the one man, in the entirety of her six hundred or so years of life, that she had ever truly loved

_I'm coming for you, Peter_… she promised, clenching her fists as she gazed at the facility before her.

Even as she knew that rescuing Peter and River was meant to be her priority on this mission- if nothing else, the rest of her 'team' would _definitely _have River's rescue high on their "To Do" list-, a part of her also hoped that Adam would be inside the facility when they finally entered it.

Right now, she wanted nothing more than to make sure that bastard's far-too-long life was ended at long last for what he had done…


	15. FacetoFace with Nightmares

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: With the events of the season of _Heroes_, I would just like to take this opportunity to clarify one thing; in this timeline, Sylar did _not _acquire Claire's power- nor did anything else that happened in Season Three happen here, such as Niki's death, Arthur's attempt to acquire the formula or Nathan's 'vendetta' against people with abilities-, so he's still as vulnerable to getting stabbed or shot as the next guy (It's just that his telekinesis, among some other abilities he's absorbed over the years, makes it a _bit_ harder to put him down than the aforementioned next guy; I've always assumed that he used his telekinesis as a kind of 'cushion' to protect himself from the worst of the attacks he suffered)

AN 2: The reference to Sylar's accelerated metabolism here was originally used in my first 'Heroes' story "Seeds of the Future"; feel free to check it out if you want

AN 3: Sorry about the delay; REALLY bad case of writer's block

From the Ashes

As soon as she reached _Serenity_'s main hanger, Claire allowed herself a slight smile as she took in the sight of all of Mal's assorted crew gathered around the ship's main door, each of them carrying weapons as they waited for her to arrive; even Kaylee, Simon and Inara were carrying guns as they prepared to storm the facility to rescue River (Claire wasn't going to kid herself that they'd have gone to these kind of lengths to save Peter; the crew weren't heartless, but, at heart, they were a family, and thus had to look out for their own first and their outside allies second).

"Everyone ready?" Claire asked, looking pointedly around at the rest of the crew.

"As we'll ever be," Zoe replied, her expression grim as she looked at Claire. "Just one thing; you're takin' into account that you're the only one of us who can't get put down easy, right?"

"Trust me, Mrs Washburne; I'm keeping that in mind," Claire confirmed, nodding at Zoe before she looked back at Mal. "OK, when we get in there, it'll be up to the two of us to look for Peter and River; my ability to heal's the only thing that can snap Peter out of whatever they did to him, and Mal's the only person who even has a _chance _of getting through whatever control they've got River under before she shoots him-"

"Hold on; River can only be guaranteed not to shoot the _captain_?" Simon interjected, looking over at Claire in confusion. "I'm her _brother_-"

"That's not the kind of connection that will get through _this _kind of control, Doctor Tam," Claire said, looking pointedly over at Simon; she respected his loyalty to his sister, but the fact remained that she wouldn't entirely count on him in a fight, which was why he was with the group that were staying with the ship. "You've seen it yourself; when her dormant programming was activated in the Maidenhead bar- and don't try and deny it; I've _seen _the footage that the Operative recorded of that particular incident-, River automatically attacked everyone in the bar as soon as they were within arm's length or she had a weapon in her hand that could reach them, and yet, when faced with Mal while she was holding a gun, she _did not shoot him_."

After waiting a moment to make sure that everyone had understood what she'd said, she turned back to look at the captain. "It's a long shot, I acknowledge it freely, but I'm certain that Captain Reynolds can get through River's conditioning; all I ask from you is that you come with me to try and find Peter and River while the rest of the crew handle Sylar-"

"Hold on; you expect us to _handle _a sucker who could destroy an entire _city _if he wanted to?" Jayne yelled, looking at Claire in a manner that suggested he'd be perfectly happy to shoot her if could be sure of reaching somewhere that could kill her (She was just grateful that she'd worked on her reflexes over the years; if he hadn't seen how fast she'd moved in her earlier fight with River he'd probably be trying for a headshot). "You really are nuttier than-"

"Do you really think Sylar's going to risk going nuclear and blowing up his only way off-planet?" Claire asked, looking over at Jayne in frustration. "He's psychotic, but he's not stupid; the nuclear generation power is good in a fight in small doses- the occasional brief 'bolt' of energy, that kind of thing-, but when you go for anything too large you reach a point where you just can't control what you're doing no matter how much training you have."

"So… he wouldn't tap into his ability to the extent where he could use it to kill all of us at once because he couldn't be sure of stopping it before he killed _everyone _here?" Simon asked, looking uncertainly at Claire; she privately wondered how long it would take him to accept the idea that people could genuinely have superpowers on their own without government involvement.

"Precisely," Claire confirmed with a brief nod before she turned to look at Zoe. "The trick in dealing with Sylar is to keep him on the ropes and come at him from multiple angles; he's powerful, but he's only really got complete control of his abilities if he focuses on one of them in particular, otherwise the ability is weakened at the very least and potentially risky for him to use at worst."

"Keep him on his toes and don't give him a chance to focus, huh?" Jayne said grimly as he examined his available ammunition for Vera once again. "Well, can't find fault with _that _strategy…"

"Glad to hear it, because it's all I have to offer," Claire replied simply, before she turned back to look at Mal. "Anyway, getting back to you and me going after Peter and River, the key thing when fighting them is that we need to switch opponents any time we think that we're getting tired and not showing any signs of getting through to them. Peter and River will be able to predict ourmoves on at least some level because they've known us for so long, but if we switch so that you're fighting Peter and I'm fighting River we might be able to take them by surprise by fighting them in a manner they're less used to."

"Thought you said Peter didn't-" Kaylee began in confusion.

"He and I trained and fought together for some time before he vanished; I can't guarantee that he won't still remember it all on _some _level even if he doesn't remember it on a _conscious _level," Claire clarified as she looked over at the other woman. "Peter's lost his memory before; even when he was at his worst, with no memory of his past, some essentials parts of his old self remained, including at least _some _of his knowledge of how to fight with his abilities…"

For a moment, she simply stood in silence, a reflective expression on her face that none of _Serenity_'s crew felt comfortable breaking with awkward questions, before she sighed and turned back to face them all one last time. "Anyway, the fine print about _why _we're using this plan isn't important right now; we've got a plan, and we need to stick to it if we're going to get out of this base with everyone we came for."

Mal nodded.

"Agreed," he said simply, indicating the door before them as he resolutely narrowed his eyes. "Well, now that all that's out the way, let's go."

Claire didn't even hesitate; reaching out, she hit the switch that would open _Serenity_'s main doors, the selected 'strike team' leaving the ship to begin their advance towards the target before them as soon as the ramp had lowered into place, Kaylee, Simon and Inara taking up their own defensive positions as they did so.

As much as they might have wanted to come along on the 'raid', the fact remained that somebody was needed to guard the ship in case any of the soldiers inside the base tried to escape that way; those three weren't great at aiming guns under pressure, but shooting people who weren't directly confronting them with weapons was a different matter.

Her sword clutched in one hand as she checked the pistol she'd selected from Mal's arsenal one last time, Claire led the charge towards the door, Mal, Zoe and Jayne close behind her. As soon as the first group of soldiers came into view- it seemed to be about five men, looking at the approaching group with a mixture of anticipation and uncertainty about what they might be up against-, the four of them had raised their weapons and shot down all five guards before they could even blink (Jayne was using two weapons simultaneously). Continuing their charge towards the main door before them, the four members of _Serenity_'s crew quickly dispatched the net wave of soldiers sent out to stop them before they finally entered the facility. Claire spared a brief moment to wonder why secret agencies had never once thought about updating their corridors- six hundred years on and the Company was _still _using that hideous shade of green for their walls?-, but pushed it to the side as she hurried along the corridor that would lead them to the area where Peter was currently located, _Serenity_'s crew right behind her.

This was it.

After over five hundred years of grieving for his loss, Claire was going to see Peter again… she was going to save him… she was going to _be _with him…

It was only when she turned around the next corner to find herself face-to-face with the man who'd once been the closest thing she'd ever had to a bogeyman even when she was a teenager who should have outgrown such fears that Claire forced her emotions over her upcoming reunion back where they should be; right now she had more immediate matters to attend to before she was once again with the man she loved.

"_Sylar_," Claire growled, her voice low as she faced the first adversary she had ever confronted, her hand tightening over her sword as she glared at the ruthless killer who had defined her life so many years ago.

"Cheerleader," Sylar replied, a casual smirk on his face as he stared back at her. "You know, it really _is _good to see you again…"

"It's _Colonel_ now, actually, Sylar," Claire countered, narrowing her eyes as she looked pointedly at Sylar, drawing her sword as she stared grimly at him. "If you're going to call me names, at least make sure they're recent-"

"Hold on; you're a _colonel_?" Mal yelled from behind her, prompting Claire to glance around in surprise at the sight of the other three members of her strike team; they'd come up behind her while she was distracted by Sylar and she'd been so focused on _him _she'd forgotten to watch what she was saying.

For a moment, she thought about denying it; it would only potentially attract further questions at a time when she didn't need them…

But, in the end, she'd had things kept from her when she wanted answers before, and it had nearly gotten her and everyone she loved killed; she wasn't going to do that to someone herself unless she was certain she had to, and right now she was far from certain.

"What; you thought I spent the last few hundred years hiding under a rock and ignoring anything that was happening in the world around me?" she replied as Jayne and Zoe came up behind him, looking at Mal with a slight smile as she regained control even as she took care to devote at least some of her attention to Sylar. "I fought in the War of Independence as a commanding officer on one of the outer planets; I believe my name at the time was Nicola Parkman, stationed around-"

"Back up a minute; wasn't Colonel Parkman one of the people involved in that 'Serenity Valley' thing I've been hearing so much about since I got here?" Sylar asked, looking at Claire with that same smirk she'd seen him assume so many times when he thought he had his opponent at his mercy and wanted to be sure that they knew it. "Y'know, one of the people who participated in the decision to pull _out _of the valley in question…?"

Claire didn't even stop to think; pulling out Hiro's old sword, she thrust it directly into Sylar's shoulder, the blade flying with such force that it went right through her opponent before pinning him to the wall behind him.

"For your information, _Gabriel_," Claire countered, using Sylar's real name as she glared at him in an attempt to make her point stick more, "I fought tooth and nail _against _abandoning Serenity Valley after all the effort that had been put into holding it; the only reason we did was that the _rest _of command thought that it wasn't a 'tactically sound' decision, despite the fact that I felt that we'd already committed so many men to that valley that we'd be foolish _not _to try and reward their dedication by continuing to do what we could to hold the damn place…"

As though she'd only just remembered where she was, Claire turned to look apologetically over at Mal and Zoe. "Sorry I didn't mention it earlier; it just never seemed like the appropriate time…"

"Doubt there's ever an appropriate time to mention something like that; can't really blame you," Zoe said, nodding briefly in understanding at Claire as she looked over at Mal. "Know what I mean, sir?"

"Quite," Mal said, nodding slightly as he looked at Claire with an unreadable expression on his face. "We'll talk 'bout that later…"

"A little optimistic, don't you think?" Sylar asked, smirking at them as he raised a glowing blue hand, ice crystals visible around it as he smirked at them. "As far as I can see, there isn't going to _be _a 'later' for you…"

Claire didn't even hesitate; before Sylar could carry out his threat, she slashed out at him with the sword that had averted his original attempt to destroy New York, impaling him through the chest with one powerful stab, smirking slightly at him before she drew the sword back out of his chest.

She knew that, with his own power of intuitive aptitude, Sylar would be able to 'close' his wound enough to allow himself to continue fighting for a while without needing treatment- the instinctive knowledge of his body that his power granted him access to could be useful in more ways than gaining new powers-, but she also knew that the need to do even _that _much would slow him down slightly in a fight, due to the need to focus attention on his injuries to prevent them getting worse.

It wasn't much of a weakness, but right now it was all that she could do to help the rest of _Serenity_'s crew; she and Mal had their own tasks right now.

"Hold the line!" Mal yelled over at Zoe; clearly he'd realised what she'd been trying to do by stabbing Sylar like that. "We'll be back!"

"Gotcha, sir!" Zoe yelled, nodding briefly at Mal before she turned her attention back to Sylar, her eyes narrowing as she raised her shotgun and fired at him. Even in his weakened state, Claire could clearly see Sylar's almost-automatic telekinetic shield rising to prevent the bullets from actually penetrating his skin, only for the sheer kinetic force of the shots fired at him- particularly from that 'Vera' weapon Jayne was so fond of using- to send the killer staggering backwards long enough for Claire and Mal to shove past him, heading on into the heart of the complex that held the people they loved.

For another few brief moments, as Claire ran through the building, it was as though the years- hell, the _centuries_- that had passed between the old day and the current crisis were nothing more than a dream, and she was once again back here she belonged, fighting alongside the closest friends she had ever had or ever would have, racing down the corridors of some other Company facility to take care of their latest renegade 'special'…

Her choice and style of allies might have changed since those days, but, in the end, one thing remained constant; Claire knew that she could trust the man she now fought alongside with her life, because he knew that he could expect the same from her.

In a matter of moments, if all went well, Peter and River would be back with them and this facility would be ground back into the dust that it had once been…

Then Peter and River came around the corner at the other end of the corridor that she and Mal had just entered, both of them dressed in the dark blue clothing that both Claire and Mal instantly recognised as the clothing of Operatives, and they both knew that the worst-case-scenario had just taken place.

The Alliance had managed to program River.

_This _definitely _isn't going to be easy_… Claire reflected, as she drew her sword again and looked grimly at the young woman before her. She might be able to outlast River in a fight- her ability to heal from physical damage fortunately extended to an ability to push herself further than almost anybody else, particularly when it came to how long she could keep going in combat-, but at the same time she wasn't exactly keen on the odds of either her or Mal managing to go head-to-head with a psychic who could read their minds _and _see the future to a certain degree.

Peter might have greater raw power, but she strongly doubted telepathy was one of the skills he had full access to; the Alliance-_Adam_- wouldn't want to risk him reading her mind and learning the full details about his past.

River, on the other hand…

This could get ugly.

Despite herself, Claire smiled.

In a strange way, she was going to look forward to this…

"Captain Reynolds," she said, out of the corner of her mouth, her attention remaining focused on the two people before her as they advanced towards her, their pace the slow, even pace of all Operatives; their training- whether genuinely experienced or programmed- was so good that many Operatives saw no need to run at their targets to catch them off-guard, preferring to allow their own relaxed attitude to put their opponents off-guard. "On my signal, charge them, but do _not _think about _anything _else; try to think of a sophisticated plan of attack-"

"River'll read it and cut me off before I can use it; gotcha," Mal replied, shaking his head slightly before he looked directly back at her, a grim expression on his face at the thought of what they were about to do. "Let's just get down to it."


	16. Fighting for Salvation

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As Claire charged towards Peter, Hiro's sword- and it would _always_ be Hiro's sword; Adam didn't deserve to be linked to the weapon she now held- clutched in her hand, she was already going over every area of the body where she could use this sword against Peter to slow him down without actually causing any long-term damage while still causing him enough pain to stop him focusing enough to use his most powerful abilities against her.

Even as Peter raised a hand blowing with the familiar blue that signified the use of the ice powers he'd only learned to fully control shortly before his… departure (A fact that Claire chose to view as a positive sign; Peter was using powers that could incapacitate rather than powers that would automatically kill), Claire lashed out with a powerful swipe that took at least three of Peter's fingers off, leaving the empath instinctively clutching his hand as the fingers began to grow back. She vaguely registered Mal charging past her to practically ram River in the chest, sending them both practically hurtling down the corridor- Mal must have launched the attack on impulse to prevent River having time to react-, but she couldn't concern herself with that right now; Peter was all she was going to have time for in this confrontation.

Refusing to give him the chance to recover his wits- as much as she hated the idea of hurting Peter she knew it was the only way- Claire slashed at his face with another sweep of the blade, leaving a scar on his face that stretched from the right side of his forehead to below the left corner of his mouth.

Even as Peter reeled back with a scream of pain, Claire kicked out at his chest, sending him staggering backwards and gasping for air, his body too buy working to repair the damage to his face to spare the energy that would allow him to regain his breath faster.

Claire had 'tested' the limits of her ability over the years, and one particularly useful thing she'd noted was that temporarily-disabling injuries took more time to heal if there was a more serious injury to deal with at the same time; by cutting Peter's face like that, she'd 'forced' his body to focus on that injury over the kick she'd delivered to his stomach, giving her a crucial few extra seconds to do what had to be done.

Even as she lunged forward with her sword, however, Claire knew that it wasn't going to do any good; Peter might be injured, but he was still aware enough of his surroundings to deflect the blow in time (Claire supposed she should just be grateful that he hadn't hit the sword directly; if he _broke _one of the only things she had left of their old 'team…'), nearly sending the sword into the wall behind him before Claire stopped her thrust. Shifting the direction of her attack, Claire swung the sword around as Peter stepped forward, leaving a long cut across his ribcage before she raised the sword-

Claire barely even had time to register that she was hurtling through the air before she hit the wall behind her with a hard crack that she knew was going to leave her neck broken; this one was _not _going to be pretty to recover from…

At the sound of approaching footsteps, Claire quickly re-evaluated her original thought on this latest mess; it wouldn't be pretty to recover from _now_, but it would be even worse if she allowed Peter to get too close to her before she could get _him _in a position where he'd _listen _to what she had to say…

* * *

As they hit the ground a few metres down the corridor from Bennett and 'Subject Alpha's' confrontation- Mal wasn't sure whether it was the surprise of his attack, his own size in comparison to River, or a combination of both that had allowed him to take her down like that, but didn't feel much like overanalysing it-, Mal barely had time to roll away from River before he felt a powerful punch strike him in the stomach, the blow merely glancing off his chest as he hurriedly scrambled to his feet. River echoed his movements as she stood up herself, but the easy fluidity of her movement from the ground to action made it clear that, brainwashed or not, she was still not going to go down easy.

"Any chance we could-?" Mal began, only to be cut off as River thrust out a fist towards his face, Mal only managing to avoid the blow thanks to the time he'd spent training with River ever since her skills were revealed; none of the crew could ever hope to match her, but she'd given them all a few pointers in what areas of hand-to-hand she could advise them in and they'd picked some tricks in return.

Admittedly, none of the skills he'd picked up during their training could help him now, but the idea of her giving them a few pointers was essentially sound; it just wasn't proving as useful as it should have been…

"Gorram it, River, _you don't want to do this_!" Mal yelled as he ducked another blow from his young pilot, her expression reflecting an inner torment that he hadn't seen on her face since that whole mess in the Maidenhead. "You're _not _their tin soldier any more; get past this gorram programming and _fight it_!"

Mal wasn't entirely certain if his words were making any kind of impact on the young woman before him as he narrowly avoided another punch aimed for his jaw; if this kept up, he might have to forget his hoped-for strategy of trying to _encourage _her to reassert herself and go with trying to knock her out…

A kick that grazed the side of his ribcage even as he ducked aside forced Mal to bring his attention back to the matter at hand; River might be evidently trying _not _to hurt him- if the faint tears in her eyes were anything to go by-, but it was clear that he was going to need to _really _focus if he was going to get through this fight intact; it was taking everything he had just to _avoid _her punches, never mind trying to think about fighting back.

_Fighting back_…

Somehow, the thought of actually _doing _that hurt Mal more than any punch River could throw at him; the thought of having to hurt River after everything else she'd been through in her life, even if it would be _nothing _compared to what she'd been through before now…

He couldn't do it; there _had _to be another way…

* * *

Claire could only be grateful that she'd learned how to cope with all kinds of death-inducing injuries over the years; she might not be able to control the rate her body healed the damage, but she knew enough to know which nerves would repair themselves first in this kind of situation to be able to defend herself while still otherwise incapacitated.

Even as Peter advanced towards her, Claire had flicked her right wrist- as though practice and habit had made her body recognise what hand she used most regularly, that was always the one to heal first-, shifting the small gun she kept concealed there into her hand and aiming it at Peter.

"Take this," she muttered with what strength she could muster, firing the gun to strike Peter's face, sending him staggering back once again as he clutched the bloody mess that had once been his left cheekbone (Claire would have hit his eye- from experience she knew that kind of injury was a _real _bitch to regenerate-, but right now she didn't have the focus necessary to aim at a target that size).

Even as Peter was turning back to look at her, Claire had already regained feeling in both arms and one leg, lashing out with a brutal kick at his nearby ankle that sent him off-balance long enough for her neck to finish repairing itself; this injury had taken a long time to heal at first, but it had become quicker with 'practise' (Even if broken necks would never be 'fun').

"Had enough yet?" Claire asked, smirking briefly at Peter as she got back to her feet, her hands clenched around Hiro's sword as she looked at him, ready for whatever he might have to throw at her.

Peter didn't answer with words- Claire couldn't help but wonder why he was being so silent now; she'd like to hope that it was the result of him fighting his 'programming' even as he continued to fight her, but she wouldn't want to get her hopes up-; instead, he raised his hands, brilliant golden light and heat surrounding his outstretched fingers in a manner that Claire recognised only too well.

Even as Peter began to generate the radiation that Ted Sprague's power granted him control of, Claire knew that she'd just reached the moment.

This was it.

No turning back.

If she didn't save Peter _now_, she'd never be able to do so; she might have survived and remained standing when Ted's powers went nuts all those centuries ago in her Odessa house, but a concentrated blast would definitely be enough to put her down for a while unless she acted fast.

Lunging forward, refusing to give herself time to be scared, Claire grabbed Peter's head in her hands- ignoring the burning pain as the radiation he was generating began to sear her flesh- and pressed her head against his, screaming out "REMEMBER!" at the top of her lungs as she fought against the burning that now seemed to consume everything around her.

It was almost automatic, as far as she could tell. No sooner had she made physical contact with Peter than everything around her suddenly seemed to withdraw into itself, the energy that he'd been generating to attack her shutting down as quickly as it had been 'activated', leaving him staring uncertainly at her.

"C…" he began, staring at her in confusion, clearly trying to place her face amid the sudden rush of memories that must be overwhelming his brain as it knitted itself back together. "Cl… Cla… Claire?"

Despite the situation they still had to deal with- Adam alone wouldn't go down easily, to say nothing of Sylar and the abilities he had 'on offer'-, Claire couldn't help but smile broadly at the sound of her name coming from Peter's lips once again.

"Oh my God…" she said, whispering half to herself as she shifted her hands so that her rough grasp of his head turned into a gentle caress. "It's you…"

After thinking him dead for over four centuries, she had at last been reunited with the one man she ever felt _really _understood her…

(OK, so the _circumstances _under which she'd found him again sucked beyond anything she'd ever encountered; after everything she'd done over the years, she felt that she'd earned the right to enjoy the moment for a little while at least before dealing with _that_…)

* * *

As he ducked below another blow, Mal was trying to think of some alternative to stopping River right now that _wouldn't _involve hitting her; even if that might work, he _really _hated that idea (And how had he _reached _this stage of his life; Hell, time was that he'd have been willing to hit _Zoe _if he felt it was absolutely necessary to do something- couldn't think when he'd have needed to do that-, and now he was refusing to hit _River_?).

Staying ahead of her might have worked out so far, but he couldn't count on that working out forever; even if River seemed to be trying to fight off whatever they'd done to her, she was evidently still tough enough to do some _serious _damage to him.

He couldn't believe he was even contemplating this; if he turned out to be wrong, River was probably going to just start trying to kill him even _harder _than she already was…

On the other hand, he reflected to himself as he narrowly avoided a kick that left him gasping for air, it was hard to imagine things getting much worse than they were right now.

Unwilling to give himself time to think about what he was about to do- based on what Claire had told him earlier thinking about it too much would probably result in River sensing his plan and stopping it-, Mal grabbed River's face- the grip was only deliberately selected to ensure that he didn't hold her head in a manner that could be interpreted as threatening; if he was in a position to break her neck or something River might automatically fight it off, but something non-threatening _could _get through her programming- and pulled her lips down to meet his.

For a moment River simply froze, apparently temporarily stunned into immobilisation by Mal's action, and then, just as Mal was starting to tense himself to pull back, he felt River's mouth beginning to slowly, uncertainly move against his own, her hands moving from their original position of preparing to attack him to tenderly clasp his shoulders…

* * *

If it had been up to Claire, she could had stayed where she was for ages, simply staring at Peter's face as she took in what had just happened, but reality swiftly intruded as Peter stepped away from her, his eyes practically brimming with confusion.

"Wh… what _happened_?" Peter asked, looking uncertainly at her, one hand holding his forehead as though he had a slight headache. "The last thing I remember is-"

Before Peter could finish that sentence, his entire body suddenly seemed to fly into the wall behind him, hitting it with an unpleasant crunching sound that left his neck dangerously twisted as he fell to the ground, blood trickling from a corner of his mouth.

Even if she knew that such an injury wouldn't kill Peter- with her healing ability now once again active in his system he'd recover from that damage promptly enough-, the circumstances under which he'd _been _injured in the first place made it clear who she was now dealing with. Claire barely even needed to see Sylar emerge from around the corridor with a cocky smirk that she had come to loath long ago.

"You," Claire said simply, her eyes narrowed as she raised the sword, already hoping that she hadn't sent Zoe and Jayne to their deaths; Sylar wouldn't have any _reason _to kill them, but with this psychopath she couldn't take anything for granted.

"Yeah, me; you didn't _really _think a few average soldiers could stop _me _for any length of time, did you?" Sylar replied, smirking slightly as he raised an eyebrow while looking at her. "Besides, you knew going in that they didn't have anything to really offer me- getting them out of the way was _ridiculously _easy, really-, but since Peter evidently _couldn't _kill you… well, I never _did _get your ability…"

"And you never _will_," Claire vowed- mentally noting that at least Sylar wasn't bragging about anyone being dead; until she knew otherwise she'd assume that Zoe and Jayne had just been knocked out and hope for the best-, raising her blade as Sylar thrust out hand to send a powerful bolt of lightning in her direction. Claire barely managed to parry the attack with the sword (Hiro had added rubber to the handle after encountering a couple of foes with electricity-based powers- including Elle Bishop before Sylar killed her-; the rubber blocked the electricity from spreading through the sword to the body of the one holding it) before shifting to the offensive, slashing at Sylar and leaving him with a cut on one arm before following it up with a punch to his face.

The force of the blow may have done more damage to Claire than to Sylar- she could already feel the bones of her hand knitting back together after the damage they'd sustained in the punch; she barely remembered to shift them back into place to prevent them healing wrongly-, but the blood from his nose at least showed Claire that she'd done _some _damage, no matter how slight it might be overall.

"You want my power?" she practically growled, her grip tightening around the blade as she stared at Sylar. "You'll have to take me _apart _before I'll stop fighting you!"

"As you wish," Sylar replied.

With that, he lashed out at the former cheerleader with a powerful slash of his fingertips, his telekinesis striking her shoulder and sending blood spurting out from it before Claire ducked out of the way. Grabbing a gun from under her coat- the sword might be her preferred weapon but this could still do some damage if used properly-, Claire took advantage of Sylar's momentary distraction to fire three bullets directly at her old foe, striking him along his left side before he could use his telekinesis to fully protect himself.

The shots didn't do much more than graze him- even when focused on an attack Sylar never let his guard down completely- but it was enough to leave a significantly-sized scratch along his chest, giving Claire the opportunity to kick out at her opponent once again before he could regain his balance.

It wasn't much of a strategy, but in the current situation the best she could do against Sylar was keep him off-balance until she could figure out some method of attack that would put him down long enough for her to get Peter out of here…


	17. Academy's End

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

As Mal parted from River, he was only slightly disappointed to see that she still didn't seem to be completely back to normal; he'd guessed that the kiss would make _some _kind of impression, but he definitely hadn't been deluding himself into thinking that it would be enough to get through _all _the programming those Alliance bastards had put her through…

"M… Ma… Mal…?" she whispered suddenly, staring at him as though she'd just caught a glimpse of him in a dark room and didn't want to attract attention to herself if she was wrong about his identity.

"Yeah… it's me," Mal replied, his voice soft as he looked at her, her eyes clearly showing the torture she felt at what the Alliance had made her do. "It's OK… it's over… you're free…"

"'Free', Captain Reynolds?" a voice said from further down the corridor that Mal automatically recognised. "I can assure you, Miss Tam will _never _be free of us."

Looking up, Mal's eyes narrowed at the sight of the man Claire had identified as Adam Monroe- the bastard who'd tried to destroy Earth-That-Was with that screwy virus and gone on to try and turn River and others like her into weapons- all those long hours ago, dressed in a long dark coat with body armour just visible underneath it…

It was funny, really; only this time yesterday, Mal hadn't even known the bastard in front of him existed.

Now…

Mal barely stopped to think as he drew his gun and fired it at Adam, the man only just ducking to the side in time to sustain a mere scratch on the side of his head rather than the direct shot to the brain that Mal had been aiming to achieve.

"Good shot, Captain Reynolds," Adam said, smiling nonchalantly at the former Independent sergeant before he reached under his coat and drew a gun of his own, this one noticeably larger than Mal's usual weapon of choice. "Too bad it wasn't good enough."

Mal didn't bother trying to run; with Bennet and that 'Sylar' whacko down the other way, and River evidently in no condition to try anything seriously physically taxing yet, there wouldn't have been much point anyway. With no other option left to him, Mal lowered his head and charged towards Adam, the unexpected nature of the attack more than anything catching Adam off-guard long enough for Mal to strike him in the chest, sending him and his immortal opponent falling to the ground in a heap.

The bastard might have way more combat experience than Mal could ever hope to get himself, but if he could just keep the bastard off-balance long enough for River to get back on her feet-

The feel of a fist striking him in the gut prompted Mal to focus his mind back on the current fight, ramming his forehead into his opponent's nose before he leapt back to his feet, trying not to focus on the somewhat-disconcerting way that the nose healed at an odd angle almost as soon as he'd damaged it in favour of launching another kick at the guy's chest.

He might not be a River Tam when it came to combat, but if he could keep this bastard on the ropes he might still have a chance…

* * *

Staring grimly back at Sylar, Claire only just managed to side-step another blast from the man's glowing blue hand- evidently his ice powers; after he'd cured himself of the Shanti virus, his previously-acquired abilities had eventually returned after he'd acquired a few samples of her blood- before she dived forward to kick him in the lower left leg with a sliding kick; only Sylar's ever-present telekinetic 'force field' prevented the blow from breaking a bone. Even as she continued to slide down the corridor, Claire pulled her gun once more and launched off another couple of bullets, smiling at Sylar's barely-restrained yell of pain as one of them apparently struck him in his-

Claire tried not to laugh- this was a life-or-death battle, there was no time for laughter-, but she couldn't stop a slight chuckle escaping her lips; the sight of Sylar clutching at a bleeding hole in his _ass _was somehow rather amusing…

Then he suddenly thrust out one hand towards her, sending her flying from the floor to hit the wall behind her with such force that she dropped her sword, her back subsequently pressed against the wall as Sylar walked towards her, a malicious gleam in his eyes as he stared at her.

"That… _hurt_," he said, flexing the fingers on his right hand as he held his left forward to keep her in place. "I am… _definitely_… going to… enjoy this…"

Claire tried to struggle against the telekinetic hold Sylar had on her, but it was too powerful; he was already raising his fingers… the blood was already trickling down from Claire's forehead into her left eye as blinding pain filled the front of her head, the former watchmaker's hand now tight around her throat, preventing her even from screaming-

Before Claire could even try and retaliate herself, Sylar suddenly vanished from in front of her, leaving her to fall to the ground, gasping for air as the wound in her head healed itself…

"Get the _hell _away from her, Sylar," a voice said from down the corridor.

Claire's eyes widened.

"P… Peter?" she whispered, turning her head to look at where the voice had come from.

Sure enough, Peter Petrelli was standing in the middle of the corridor, one hand outstretched in the direction of Sylar's currently-dazed body at the other end of the corridor, a resolved glare on his face that swiftly faded away as his eyes flicked over to look in her direction.

"Hey, Claire," he said, a small smile on his face as he looked at her. "Thanks; it's good to be back."

Then his gaze returned to Sylar. "And as for _you_…"

Shifting his stance, Peter spread his hands and fire erupted from his palms, his eyes narrowing as they stared at his counterpart.

"You're dead," the empath said simply.

"Funny," Sylar replied, a slight smirk on his lips as he looked back at Peter, spreading his own hands to generate his ice powers. "That's what I was going to say to you."

With that, the two men charged towards each other, the collision of energy as their two powers made contact sending both men flying back a few feet from the force of the blast, Peter regaining his balance more quickly than Sylar thanks to his flight. As Sylar prepared to hurl another blast of ice at Peter, Peter thrust his hand forward once again, sending Sylar off-balance long enough for Peter to follow up with a fireball that seared the side of Sylar's head, burning off a significant portion of hair and leaving his left ear a blistering red.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, clearly refusing to give his foe the satisfaction of screaming, Sylar launched a burst of ice at Peter once again, only for Peter to halt the ice with a burst of fire, following the blast up by charging directly towards Sylar in a burst of superspeed that sent Sylar flying back from the force of the punch (Claire wasn't sure if Peter had used his strength at that point, but quite frankly anything moving at that speed would have been damaging). Peter was just about to launch another charge when Sylar suddenly raised one hand and struck Peter with a blast of ice, leaving the empath covered in frost as he stared in shock at the other man.

"Ah…" Sylar said, smiling slightly as he got back onto his feet, staring at Peter with a satisfied smirk. "Now _this _is more like it…"

Claire knew from experience that Peter could easily recover from something like that on his own; with her healing ability, it was practically impossible to do anything to Peter that would stop him for good short of impaling him in the head, and he was almost certainly just working out the best way to deal with the ice around him at this moment.

Unfortunately, with Sylar now standing in front of him and clearly ready to do some damage _before _Peter could get moving again, he wasn't going to _get _that time, and his current position meant that Claire couldn't shoot him without hitting Peter-

Then the sound of a gunshot resulted in a spurt of blood coming from Sylar's shoulder, and Claire allowed herself to relax as she got back to her feet in time to see Zoe and Jayne standing at the other end of the corridor, Zoe's shotgun raised and the barrel smoking as she glanced over at Claire.

"Take it the frozen guy's on our side now?" she asked briefly.

"Uh… yeah, he is," Claire confirmed.

"Good," Zoe said, as she turned her attention back to Sylar- who was now staring at her with an incredulous gaze as he clutched at his shoulder, clearly unable to believe what she'd just done-, raised her gun once more, and fired directly at Sylar's face. Before Sylar could move to avoid the gunshot, the blast had struck him in the face- his mind clearly still too dazed at the shock of the injury to his shoulder for him to maintain his telekinetic 'shield', even assuming it could have totally stopped something that powerful-, sending a significant portion of his head flying off to splatter against the wall. For a moment Sylar simply stared back at Zoe with his one remaining eye, almost as though he couldn't believe what had just happened to him, before he collapsed to the ground in a heap, his skull making a sound disturbingly like that of a cracking egg as he hit the floor.

Claire couldn't help but stare in renewed awe at Zoe; after what Sylar had done back on Earth when he'd been at his peak, the idea that he could just be killed _that _easily…

She wasn't _complaining _that he was dead, of course; it just seemed so… _simple_.

"Whoa…" she said at last, her voice breaking the silence as she looked at Zoe with a brief smile of approval. "Nice job."

"Thanks," Zoe said, nodding back at Claire before she indicated the still-frozen form of Peter, whose hands were now glowing with the intense blue flames that Claire recognised as his pyrokinetic powers. "Should I-?"

"_No_," Claire said, shaking her head firmly. "He's… he's on _our _side now."

Before Zoe could ask for further clarification, there was a brief 'explosion' of ice, and suddenly Peter was standing in the middle of a small puddle of water, his clothes dripping from the melted ice as he looked at Sylar's fallen body.

"What the _Hell_…?" he muttered before he glanced up at Zoe and Jayne as they stood at the other end of the corridor, Zoe's gun still slightly smoking after firing the last shot. "Oh."

"Yeah, 'oh', you whacked-out powerhouse; the other sonuva bitch's dead," Jayne replied, cocking a gun that Claire vaguely recalled- from Jayne's earlier examination of his weaponry back on _Serenty_- was referred to as 'Vera' as he aimed it at Peter. "You wanna join him?"

"Does the fact that I'm not _interested _in killing anyone mean much?" Peter asked, looking uncertainly at Jayne.

"It does to _me_," Claire put in as she stood up, glaring briefly over at Jayne before she turned back to face Peter, a broad, if uncertain, smile on her face as she looked at him.

She almost couldn't believe it; after everything that had happened since she last saw him… everything she'd been through… everyone she'd lost…

She had him back.

She had Peter Petrelli back…

Then the sound of someone grunting in pain down the corridor forced them to end the moment.

"Mal?" Jayne asked, looking back at Claire uncertainly.

"He's down there," Claire confirmed, looking back at Peter uncertainly. "Could you… are you…?"

"Able to help out?" Peter said, looking grimly over at Claire. "Trust me… after what those _bastards _did to me…"

He trailed off, but the clenched fists and hardened glare on his face made his thoughts on the current topic clearer to Claire than anything he could have said.

It hadn't been expressly stated, but he _definitely _remembered what had happened while he was under the Academy's control…

And he was ready to unleash some _serious _pain as a consequence.

* * *

Mal wasn't sure how long he'd been doing this; he'd definitely been trading blows with this 'Adam' bastard for a while now, but with this bastard's ability to heal repairing all the damage _he _was causing, the only sign that he'd actually accomplished anything was all the blood covering the bastard's clothing, and at least half of that probably came from _him _rather than Adam…

God, he hadn't taken a beating like this since he fought the Operative, and at least that guy had had the decency to feel _pain _when he got punched in the face; this guy just kept on _coming_…

As he was suddenly pinned to the ground, Mal just had time to see Adam pull something long, thin and sharp out of his pocket- the exact details were currently hard to see through the blood in his eyes- and aim it at Mal's face when, without any warning, something seemed to throw Adam off to the side, leaving Mal gasping for air through a mouth that felt like there was more blood than teeth inside it as Zoe crouched down to examine him, the dim figures of Jayne, Bennet and what looked like the former 'Subject Alpha'- clearly de-programmed- just visible out of the corner of his eye.

"You look like crap, sir," Zoe said, looking him over with a slight smile.

"Aim… t'please…" Mal muttered, looking back at her with a slight smirk as he slowly got back to his feet, his eyes falling on the new member of the group. "So… Peter, right?"

"Yeah," the man replied, nodding in confirmation at Mal. "Thanks for helping Claire out, by the way.

"No problem," Mal replied with a slight smile. "We ex-Independents have to stick together, after all-"

Further conversation was cut off when Mal heard someone charging towards him, Peter only just managing to push Mal aside in time to raise one hand and send Adam hurtling backwards once again, the almost millennium-old immortal pinned against the wall as he stared angrily at the small crew gathered before him.

"You think… _this_… solves _anything_?" he asked, staring angrily at Peter and Mal. "The Academy will continue without me; the worlds _need _order-"

"Maybe so," Mal said, raising his gun to aim at Adam, enjoying the sudden fear in the other man's eyes; he wasn't the type to normally take pleasure in fear, but after what he'd heard about this bastard from Claire- to say nothing of what he'd done to River-, he'd be lying if he said he _wasn't _going to enjoy this. "But it doesn't need _your _brand of 'order'… and it _definitely _doesn't need you."

With that, he raised his gun, aimed-

And then a shut suddenly sounded from behind him- Mal could almost swear he _felt _it go past his cheek- before a red hole suddenly appeared in the middle of Adam's forehead, prompting the man's mouth to drop open in an almost comic expression of surprise before his body slumped slightly in front of them, completing the 'trip' as Peter lowered his hand and ended whatever he'd been doing to keep Adam up there, the body falling to the ground right in front of them.

Turning around, Mal wasn't sure what to think when he saw River Tam standing behind them, a smoking gun in her right hand as she stared at the place where Adam's body had been before she turned around to look at Mal.

"Hi," she said briefly, her tone slightly uncertain; only the intensity in her eyes stopped Mal from worrying that she'd had another 'better in red' moments like when she'd slashed Jayne's shirt. "I'm back."

Despite himself, Mal couldn't help but smile.

"That you are, darlin'," he said, nodding in understanding at her. "That you are."

"Come on," Claire said, looking grimly at the base around her before she glanced over at Peter. "Let's go; we've got a facility to torch before we can leave."

"Hold on; the _facility_?" Jayne said, looking over at Claire in frustration. "Lady, contrary to whatever Mal implies, I don't have _that _many grenades on me-"

"Who said anything about grenades?" Peter asked, raising his hands to generate two large glowing balls of energy, smirking slightly as he glanced around at the crew. "Give me a few minutes to let you guys get out of here, and I'll have this place torched down to nothing in half that."

"And then?" Mal asked.

"_Then _he'll join us on _Serenity _so that you can take us somewhere else," Claire finished, looking at Mal with a pointed gaze that made it easy to see how this woman had commanded armies during the Independence War; she definitely didn't look like she'd accept 'no' as an answer.

"Gotcha," Mal said, nodding in understanding at the seemingly-younger woman before he turned around to look at the rest of his crew. "Well… let's go."

He just wished that, as he walked out of the facility with Zoe, Jayne, River and Claire, his eyes didn't keep drifting over to the form of his newly-returned pilot, his thoughts constantly shifting to a topic he _really _didn't want to be thinking about near her…


	18. Four Become Two

Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

From the Ashes

A couple of hours later, as _Serenity _drifted through the black towards the closest planet that was within fuel range while being far enough away from the facility that the odds of anyone finding them there were slim at best, Claire sat on her bed and stared silently at Peter as he sat on the edge of the bed in their cabin on _Serenity_, his own gaze fixed on nothing in particular.

"Six hundred years…" he said, evidently unable to believe it. "I jumped over _six hundred years_…"

"And an unspecified number of light-years; I… well, I dozed off when they were announcing how far away we'd be going from Earth when we were boarding the ships and I never got around to asking for clarification later," Claire said, shrugging helplessly as she looked at Peter. "All I know is, it's far; the Company had to discreetly get a _dozen _people involved whose abilities involved enhanced knowledge to some extent or another- a guy with a tamer version of Sylar's intuitive aptitude, a girl with enhanced memory, that kind of thing- just to make sure the ships were advanced enough to make the trip in the first place, and don't even get me _started _on what they had to develop to make sure everything was habitable when we got here…"

"Right…" Peter said, nodding in slightly-dazed understanding as he looked at Claire, an apprehensive expression filling his gaze. "And… you're over six _centuries _old?"

Claire's eyes widened slightly in understanding.

At least that answered the question of _why _Peter was looking at her like that…

"Side effect of being able to heal like this," she said nonchalantly, before she reached over to place a reassuring hand on Peter's. "Don't worry about me, though; I kept in touch with the old group right up to the end, and I've always been able to call on their families when I need someone to talk to- I generally pass myself off as my own daughter or something like that; I space out my visits enough to stop anyone clearly remembering what I looked like the last time I dropped in-, so it hasn't been too bad."

"Good," Peter said, smiling slightly at her. "I'm… well, it's good to know you weren't alone."

"But…" Claire added, reaching over to place a hand on Peter's as she leaned forward slightly, "even with the ability to live this long, you know the one thing I've _never _managed to find?"

"What?" Peter asked, looking uncertainly back at her.

"Someone like you," Claire replied.

She knew that she'd changed a lot over the years- you had to adapt in order to survive in a world like this-, but if there was one thing she knew _hadn't _changed about her, it was what she'd tried to be in Peter's memory; never be cruel, never be cold, and always fight for those who can't…

She wasn't denying that there wouldn't be some parts of her that weren't what Peter remembered- just as there were things about Peter she might have forgotten or 'coloured over' in her recollections of him-, but she was willing to work on them to be with him.

With that, she leaned over and kissed Peter directly on the lips, all thoughts of the reasons why she'd stopped herself from doing this back in the past now abandoned among the ruins of Earth-That-Was all those long centuries ago.

Unlike other people who simply _said _they'd waited centuries for something to happen, Claire literally _had _waited that long to reach this stage, and she was rapidly learning that the dreams she'd had in the past were nowhere _near _as good as the reality was turning out to be…

"_No_," Peter said, pulling away from her (With, Claire noted with satisfaction, evident reluctance on his face as he spoke; no matter what had happened to him since the last time they'd seen each other, clearly his current protests were mainly made out of habit rather than anything else). "We _can't_… we're-"

"Related?" Claire countered, smiling slightly at Peter as she raised an eyebrow at him in that slightly teasing way that always made him want to kiss the eyebrow in question. "Maybe that was an issue back when we actually _had _any family around to give a crap about it… but that's not the case any more."

"But… but it's…" Peter began, looking at Claire in a manner that made it clear to Claire that he was encouraging her to contradict him before he said something he'd regret.

"OK, so anything we do might not be exactly… conventional… but what in our lives _is _normal anyway?" Claire said, smiling slightly as she leant slightly over Peter, 'encouraging' the chronologically-older man- experience-wise Claire was definitely his elder even if physically they were now about the same age- to fall back onto the bed beneath him. "Besides, you're going to need to stick with me for a while if you're going to actually learn _anything _about the way things are now- even without the fact that the human race is spread out across several different planets, civilisation's not exactly the same as what it was back when we were all on Earth-, and where's the point in doing that if we're just going to make ourselves miserable by denying ourselves what we really want all over again?"

"But…" Peter began to say once again, his eyes displaying an ever-increasing reluctance to actually continue this line of protest.

"Peter… anyone we could have realistically _hurt _by doing… this… died a long time ago; who's actually going to _know _that we're doing anything… like this?" (Claire wasn't going to say _anything_ about their feelings being wrong; without any living family to judge them, as far as she was concerned their opinions were no longer relevant). "_Denying _how we felt wasn't doing anything for us but making _us _miserable back then; with everyone who would have objected back then… _gone_, what difference does it make if we do it now?"

For a moment, as Peter looked silently back at Claire, he wondered if this was really the best idea; just because the people who would have _objected _to this relationship were gone, that didn't meant that potential issues didn't exist, such as whether he and Claire would be able to have kids (He'd be lying if he hadn't thought about it once or twice) given their close genetic link…

Then Claire's warm, soft lips met his once again, and Peter's mind tuned out any thoughts that might have stopped him from doing what he'd wanted to do since that long-ago conversation in a Texas jail cell.

If things _did _go that far, maybe their healing abilities would compensate for any potential genetic damage that might result from their shared bloodline; he'd look into that later, when Claire _wasn't _doing things with her lips that felt so good they might have been illegal even if they _weren't _happening between relatives…

* * *

As Mal sat at the dining table in the main part of _Serenity_, he couldn't help but be amazed at what had happened to him in the last few days.

Not only had they practically single-handedly shut down a government project to create superhuman soldiers- to say nothing of having made a couple of new friends Mal wouldn't mind seeing again; they might have too much of a 'command presence' to make a prolonged stay on _Serenity _comfortable for him or them, but they were decent company for all that-, but he'd taken on a man who could measure his age in _centuries _and walked away alive, followed by the aforementioned psycho being shot in the brain and his body subsequently vaporised by a guy who, according to all available information, was the most powerful bastard to ever live…

And now, here they were, just heading off to another planet like nothing strange had happened and this whole mess had just been another day at the metaphorical beach.

There were _definitely _times when Mal wondered when his life had gone this weird and what he could do to get out of it…

Then, of course, his mind drifted back to the one good thing that _had _come out of his aforementioned 'weird' life- a certain psychic with what he vaguely recalled Bennet describing as 'photographic reflexes'- and couldn't help but think that it had all been worth-

_NOT gonna go there_!

"Why?" a voice said from behind him.

Spinning around sharply, Mal's eyes widened at the last sight he wanted to see when his thoughts were going the way they were going; River Tam, dressed in one of her normal wisp-esque dresses that somehow managed to look innocent while still providing a man with a glimpse of _way _more than he was comfortable with seeing when his thoughts turned that way-

_STOP THAT_!

"You don't have to," River said, smiling slightly at him as she walked into the room, leaning against the table as she smiled at him, her dress displaying far more below the neck than Mal felt was good for his health when the girl in question had a brother with access to various sharp implements…

"Uh… not entirely sure I know what you're meanin' there, albatross…" Mal said, trying to think of a way to leave that wouldn't make his anxiety at the current situation too obvious.

"Your thoughts," River replied, a slight smile on her face as she walked over to the table, smiling at him as she sat down opposite him. "You always keep them off what you want to think about."

"Well… sometimes a man doesn't have the time t'think 'bout that-" Mal began.

"And sometimes he has to," River said, her smile remaining as she leaned over slightly at him, giving him a view of the contents of her dress that was doing his mental state no good at all. "You saved me."

"Well, y'know, you're on my crew…" Mal began awkwardly, already knowing as he said it that River wasn't going to buy that reason for his actions when his traitorous eyeballs kept on drifting down to a point slightly lower than her face…

God, he almost wished this _was _just a lust thing; the fact that the woman was becoming a lot more stable these days and was displaying an excellent grasp of flying didn't exactly help his attempts to convince him not to start anyth- and what the _Hell _was he doing thinking about-?

The sudden feel of River's lips against his own cut off Mal's train of thought before it could progress further. For a moment he allowed himself to relax against the gentle pressure he now felt on his mouth- her inexperience showed, but she was _definitely _improving; that thing with her tongue-, but then he sharply pulled away as where he was and who he was doing this with came back to him.

"Gorram it, what-?" he began.

"Nobody's coming," River said, smiling reassuringly at him as she raised a finger to his lips, cutting him off before he could continue his sentence. "Zoe and Inara are resting in their cabins, Jayne's cleaning his guns, and Simon and Kaylee are doing the same thing as Peter and Claire; they'll _all _be out of this room for the next few minutes at least."

"That's not what-" Mal tried to say again.

"It's easier for you this way," River said, reaching out to gently stroke his cheek with one hand before reaching back to hold his head in a tender yet firm grip that managed to avoid being tight while still making it clear that he wasn't going to be allowed to back out of this any time soon. "You don't have to worry about being interrupted; just… do what you _want _to do."

"And…" Mal began, swallowing slightly as he prepared to say something that he knew he was going to regret later if she believed it, "what makes you sure that… _this_… is what I want to do?"

"I heard it," River replied, that same teasing smile on her face as she leaned in towards him once again. "You can't lie to me, Malcolm; I've been listening and doing nothing for too long… I nearly lost the chance to do _anything_… and no power in the 'verse will stop me from doing _this_."

With that, River crossed the last few crucial feet and met Mal's mouth with hers once again, her grip on his head cutting off any thoughts of pulling away as the last barriers of resistance crumbled away at her words.

She was right about one thing; if the Academy or the Company or whatever they wanted to call themselves had succeeded, she wouldn't have been doing much of anything with herself.

This… right here, right now, between the two of them, in their ever-chaotic lives… might be the only chance they had to go for what they wanted…

God, Mal only had to _think _about Claire to know that sometimes the moment was all you had; it had been centuries since she'd lost Peter and she'd _still _regretted never taking a chance at being with him.

If it was a choice between living with that kind of regret and taking a chance to get what he wanted now more than anything…

He'd take what he could get and hope that the man with the pointy objects who was in charge of his health wouldn't mind the idea of him and his sister doing… _this_… too much…


End file.
